


War and Whispers

by idanato



Series: The Darkest Mage Timeline [7]
Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Angst, Battle Scenes, Betrayal, Canon Divergence, Crimson Flower Route, Game Spoilers, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, Post-Time Skip, Recovery, Referenced Sex, Spying, Strong Language, an inconvenient baby, break ups, broken relationships referenced, marriages, minor Ferdinand/Bernadetta, minor Ingrid/Sylvain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-02
Updated: 2019-12-18
Packaged: 2021-02-25 20:41:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 13
Words: 52,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21641623
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/idanato/pseuds/idanato
Summary: The Crimson Flower is losing its petals one by one as the war draws to a close.Hubert is a dog on a short leash held by Agarthan masters, Lysithea is dying, and no longer slowly, while Felix sits in a cell far away, Mercedes followed Jertiza down a path she can't come back from, Hilda is a prisoner of war unsure who she should betray, and Byleth is one divine pulse away from breaking. They do what they can behind the scenes and hope to survive.///This mixes elements of multiple routes, but primarily focuses on the events of Crimson Flower's final chapters.
Series: The Darkest Mage Timeline [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1536886
Comments: 46
Kudos: 100





	1. Battle for Brigid

Hubert had a choice, he could take out the archer aiming at Petra, or he could strike down the enemy running towards him, but there was not enough time to deal with both. Hubert swallowed and whipped around to cast Miasma at the archer before she could loosen her arrow. As he watched the archer fall, the church soldier crashed into Hubert’s side with a gauntlet. Hubert yelled out as cast a counter spell, felling the brawler too.

“Hubert, were you hit?” Petra shouted down to him from that awful wvyern she now rode. “I should be taking you to Linhardt.”

He knew she would never continue on without him if she saw this injury, but today was a battle in which every delay meant someone else was in danger of falling. That was not an acceptable risk to Hubert. The whole battle had gone sideways from the moment Petra had gone west and Bernadetta had fled east, straight into an ambush. He was their primary tactician but he had no idea what was going on right now in the densely forested terrain. Petra had been giving him updates from the air, yet nothing she reported brought him any confidence. They needed these reinforcements, and Hubert was willing to take the chance and wait for a healer to find him. Petra was going to be absolutely livid with him later, but it was better that she be pissed off at him than mourning the loss of one of their friends.

Hubert pulled his cape forward to obscure his wound. “It’s a scratch, just go!” Hubert shouted pointing to the narrow gap in the trees. If she could get through there, she could bring the Brigid reinforcements and maybe they wouldn’t lose any more ground today. He saw her nod and turn her wyvern to continue on without him. Hubert touched his wound and grimaced as his white glove came away dark red with blood. He doubled over in pain when he was sure she would not see him.

There was a mighty cracking sound in the forest from where they had just come from. Hubert watched in disbelief as reddish glows lit up the patch of trees like lighting; two relics were clashing. He didn’t have to see to guess that it was probably Catherine wielding Thunderbrand facing off against the professor. Hubert cursed under his breath; of course, Catherine would show up now. Hubert had been promised beaches, but he was pretty sure Brigid was hell.

He wasn’t in any shape to go help Byleth, and frankly he didn’t think she needed any from him. When she resurfaced less than a year ago, Hubert had been intensely suspicious of their aloof professor. Byleth was exactly the same, and had no explanation of where she’d been the last five years. It was as if she had gone down for a short nap and woken up to a completely changed world. To Hubert, this screamed Agarthan replacement, but Edelgard had resolutely shut him down and welcomed Byleth back into the inner circle.

Drawing in a sharp and painful breath, Hubert focused on moving in the direction Petra had flown, hoping that the next person he ran into would be an ally of the Empire. He stumbled from tree to tree as his legs grew more and more uncooperative, until finally Hubert conceded to sit against a trunk. He loosened his cape and wedged it between his side and the tree to apply pressure to the wound. He laughed to himself over his stupidity, this was a terrible way to die. He pictured Petra lecturing his ghost _“I was telling you so”_. If he survived this, he’d promise to always retreat as long as she was there to go back to.

He worked on keeping himself awake. His head kept nodding, helping him to snap back into the present each time his chin fell into his chest. Each time his world went dark, it took a little longer for the light to come back.

He could hear the tell tale sound of a bowstring being drawn back. “B-Bernie,” he mumbled hopefully as his mind raced to wake back up. Hubert lifted his head to see a familiar face.

“It’s not like you to let yourself get hit,” said Shamir contemptuously. He hadn’t actually seen her since the rebellion started; he’d only seen the aftermath of the places she’d been. The fact that she was showing herself to him now told him she saw he was no threat at all.

Hubert tried raising his hand to prepare to cast, but it was shaking too hard. He let it drop back to his side, “If you’re planning to kill me, can you get on with it?” His words didn’t seem as powerful punctuated by his wheezing breathing.

Shamir snorted as she looked down at him, “A slow death is what you deserve von Vestra.”

Hubert managed to grin, “I would prefer to stay alive as long as possible.”

He could make out her scowl as she aligned her arrow. At this range, it would take a miracle for her to miss. He probably shouldn’t have made a joke to her of all people.

There was an especially loud clash of the relics nearby followed the sound of Catherine’s yelling. It seemed the fight was pushing closer. Shamir paused, and turned her head to listen better.

Hubert coughed, which was as close as he could get to a laugh, causing pain to shoot up his side. He gritted his teeth, “Sounds like your partner might need your help with the professor.”

“Go to hell Hubert,” hissed Shamir as she took off in a run toward the direction of the fight.

“I think I might already be there,” said Hubert to no one in particular as he let his head tip back to rest against the tree. He could barely tell if it were minutes or hours passing as he sat. It hardly mattered at this point.

There was a scuffle in the tree line that seemed to wake him back up, but Hubert couldn’t focus well enough to see if the persons emerging were friends or foes. He heard a yell as a church soldier fell near him while a familiar smoky stench of black magic hung in the air.

“Ferdinand, get Linhardt, now,” ordered Dorothea sounding uncharacteristically grave. She knelt beside Hubert and pulled his cape away only to gasp.

“You’re actually worried about me?” managed Hubert as she eased him onto his uninjured side. The words came rough and wheezing. It hurt to speak, but it hurt worse to stop joking; when that happened he was pretty sure he was actually going to die.

“You elevate a wound, you idiot,” said Dorothea as she cradled his head on her lap.

“How bad is it, you can tell me,” he whispered. Now that he was on his side he was beginning to feel nauseous and his throat felt strangely full.

She was compressing the wound with one hand, and holding his hand with the other. She gave it a hard squeeze. “It’s, it’s not great Hubie.”

“If you ever wanted a deeper look inside me, now’s your chance,” wheezed Hubert.

She laughed but he could also hear she was crying. “You’re the worst.”

“Save your tears,” started Hubert, “For someone who deserves them.” He couldn’t feel her hand anymore, even though he could see it holding his. If she responded he didn’t hear it.

***

“He’s fucking bleeding out Lin, do something,” snapped Dorothea. Linhardt had been working for a half an hour and Hubert was just getting worse.

“I can see that thank you,” said Linhardt curtly as he re-submerged his hand into the wound. “If I don’t seal up all his insides before his outside, he’s going to continue to bleed internally.”

“Can’t you work any faster?” she demanded. The wound traced up his left side from beneath his navel to his rib cage. When she had moved him, Hubert had started to vomit blood as he passed out. Lin had at least gotten that to stop, but Hubert had completely lost what little color he had. He felt cold in her arms and if were not for the shallow breaths he was still taking, Dorothea would have sworn he was a corpse.

Ferdinand put a gentle hand on Dorothea’s shoulder, “You don’t have to keep holding him, just let Linhardt do his work.”

Dorothea jerked away from his touch, “Don’t any of you care that Hubert is dying?”

Ferdinand swallowed, “Of course we care, but yelling at Linhardt is not helping.”

Dorothea trembled as she relented and allowed Ferdinand help her up and away from Hubert’s body. Other healers were finally reaching them, and Hubert was quickly surrounded. She shut her eyes as Ferdinand held her through her trembling. “If this can happen to him, it can happen to any of us,” she whispered.

“He’s not going to die,” promised Ferdinand.

“You don’t know that,” sobbed Dorothea.

“I do, Edelgard didn’t give him permission to–”

Dorothea shoved Ferdinand away; she didn’t want to hear any jokes. “It’s not funny.” She wiped her nose on her sleeve and looked at the clearing, “He was following Bernadetta, where is she? What if she’s still out there hurt too?”

Ferdinand held up his hands to try to calm her, “Caspar found her, she was separated from them during the ambush. She’s fine.”

“Good,” whispered Dorothea as she saw Byleth walking towards them.

The battle was over; they had won, but barely. Petra had come riding back with a host of Brigid soldiers that had finished off the any remaining stragglers that hadn’t fled back for the mainland with Catherine.

Byleth was holding her arm where Catherine had landed a rare hit. The professor stood stoically watching Linhardt work as if casually waiting her turn to be healed. As always, her expression was impossible to decipher.

Dorothea frowned, “Do you have _anything_ to say?”

The professor’s unnatural green eyes were tracing over Hubert indifferently, “He doesn’t make miscalculations. He took this in favor of a worse hit.”

There was a time when Dorothea was intoxicated by the professor. She had been younger then, naive; war had changed her, but the professor seemed much the same. Dorothea hated that Byleth didn’t seem to have any emotion when one of their former students was hurt. The professor’s refrain seemed to be, _“It could have been worse”_. This made Dorothea feel constantly hysterical in comparison, and Dorothea despised that. It was normal to feel something after a fight, but Dorothea always felt like she was far more upset than her peers. “Is that it? That’s all you have to say about it?”

Byleth shrugged.

Dorothea forced a smile, “Thanks for the pep talk teach, I hope you can muster the same level of care when it’s me on the ground with my guts coming out.” Dorothea stormed away from it all towards where the rest of the surviving troops were gathering. She did her best not to let her eyes linger too long on the wounded while she walked.

She pulled off her blood soaked sleeves and discarded them. She wasn’t sure she could salvage that mess, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to. In a daze she studied the dried blood that went up to at least her elbows. She always felt filthy after battles, but right now she felt like she might never get clean again. Dorothea briefly considered walking straight into the ocean as if that might be able to scrub the stain on her soul. Dorothea snapped herself out of such thoughts and continued to move forward.

As Dorothea got closer she could see Caspar comforting Bernie, who was visibly shaking but otherwise fine. Dorothea rolled her eyes, and continued past them. She wasn’t in the mood to help Bernadetta with her post battle-shock today; it wasn’t like this was their first fight. After five years it was getting old.

Petra looked elated as she came towards Dorothea but her face quickly fell as she got closer. “What, what has happened?”

Dorothea pulled Manuela’s old flask out of her corset. A final memento to remember her fallen friend and mentor. “Lin is still working out in the field. I couldn’t stay out there anymore.” She took a drink and offered it to Petra, who refused. Dorothea shrugged and took another drink; she had a feeling she’d be emptying it later. “Hubert is,” Dorothea’s voice trailed off as she struggled to figure out what to say. “He couldn’t be moved, not yet.”

Dorothea watched as Petra’s hands shot up to cover her mouth. “Oh no,” She looked like she might be ill, “He was telling me he was okay.”

“You were there?” Dorothea demanded with ice in her voice. “You saw him get hit, and you _left_?”

Petra’s huge eyes were mournful as she stared at Dorothea, “I did not see that I was in range of an archer.” Petra’s words were whispered, “And Hubert was removing her instead of a closer enemy.” She closed her eyes, “He told me to go on.”

“And you believed him?” Dorothea asked incredulously as she grabbed Petra by the shoulders. “This is Hubert we’re talking about, of course he fucking lied.” She practically shouted the last part into Petra’s face.

“If I hadn’t been going, we wouldn’t have been getting the reinforcements,” Petra had begun to break down in tears. People were starting to stare.

Dorothea released Petra who seemed to shrink away from her, “I’m sorry! I know you wouldn’t leave him behind unless he told you to.” Dorothea rubbed her temples, “It’s like there’s no fucking break. Even when we win, we lose.”

Petra dried her eyes and in a tiny voice whispered, “I will be going to them, to see if I can be helping.”

Dorothea didn’t say anything as she watched Petra marching back towards the field. Dorothea wondered how Edelgard would react to the outcome of the battle; she hadn’t even wanted to send anyone to Brigid in the first place. Edelgard thought it was a waste of resources to even bother with securing the archipelago, but Hubert had insisted on it. He had reasoned with Edelgard that if they didn’t take it, Dagda would.

While Edelgard had relented, she herself had stayed behind in Enbarr, continuing to direct the empire’s main forces with what remained of her council. The professor had come to ensure a quick and smooth victory, neither of which had happened today. Dorothea wondered how Edie would cope without her tireless servant, but given the way Edelgard had begun to lean on the professor the moment Byleth resurfaced, Dorothea was no longer sure if Hubert was even essential to his liege anymore. However, even if Edelgard didn’t need him, Dorothea very much did.

It was selfish of her, but Dorothea could not imagine being the lone mage on the battlefield. Hubert was willing to run straight into danger when it was needed. When she wasn’t feeling brave, Dorothea could follow and support his attacks. They made a decent team, and the idea of having to assume his role terrified her. He’d saved her more times than she was willing to admit, although to her credit she’d returned the favor a time or two. It wasn’t just on the battlefield, somehow in the last five years, she had actually become good friends with Hubert. The idea of not seeing his stupid smirk in the morning when he caught her sneaking out of someone else’s tent, or tricking him into blushing and blustering simply by asking him how he felt about Petra, made something deep inside Dorothea snap.

Dorothea quietly found a secluded step to park herself on. It was nearly dark by the time Ferdinand and the professor brought Hubert back on a stretcher. Dorothea’s flask was empty by then; she followed them inside in silence.

***

Hubert’s eyes opened to an unfamiliar dark room. He groaned as he moved, finding his entire body ached. The last moments he remembered were coming back.

“Hubie?” Dorothea broke the darkness by lighting a candle. She wiped her eyes dry as she looked at him. She looked almost as bad as he felt.

“Are you drunk?” Hubert winced as he smirked at her. It was like their first year at the monastery all over again. He was actually surprised that she was here though. He had been expecting someone else.

“If you ever do this to me again, I’ll kill you,” said Dorothea. She looked like she might start crying again.

“I didn’t do this to you, I did this to myself,” groaned Hubert as he tried to sit up. He gave up quickly, everything hurt. She was staring at him like he was about to drop dead, “Don’t look at me like that.”

“I just,” she started. Dorothea took a deep breath and whispered, “You really scared me this time.”

“This time?” He furrowed his brow; he had a splitting headache to add to his pains. “When was the last time I almost got chopped in half?”

“It’s not funny,” she whispered. “I’m not even half the mage you are, and if this could happen to you, it could happen to me too–”

“I’m not a better mage,” interrupted Hubert as he shut his eyes, “Besides, it wasn’t a matter of skill, I made a choice and this was the consequence.” He weakly offered his hand, which was about the only thing he could do, and she took it, “I take it we won.”

Dorothea nodded, “Petra was able to come back just in time.”

“Good, then I did make the right call after all,” said Hubert as he stared up at the planks of the ceiling. There were small patterns painted along the border of the wall that were reminiscent of Petra’s tattoos. He could get lost in those patterns if he stared at them too long.

How many times had he thought he’d seen her wyvern hit by the archer, and her falling to her death? Two times, three? It was never a full-on hallucination, just a glimmer on his periphery of what would be if he didn’t act.

This wasn’t the first time Hubert had seen things that weren’t actually happening on the battlefield. There had been one particular battle only a few months ago where he swore it felt like he was repeating his motions in a loop. He felt like he was going crazy trying the same spell over and over against an enemy that just would not quit. Finally, Hubert caught a break and was able to kill his opponent with a single spell; and after that it was as if the world returned to normal and loop had broken. He had looked around in disbelief wondering if he was going crazy, but only caught the eyes of Byleth staring intently at him.

Byleth had cornered him after the fight had finished, “What do you remember from what could have been?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about –“ Hubert never enjoyed being questioned by Byleth; she was so blunt in her words and her reactions were impossible to read sometimes. Edelgard’s infatuation with Byleth only made it worse on him.

“Do you remember dying?” Byleth was serious.

At the end of each loop, Hubert had seen a flash of darkness. “That was me, _dying_?”

Byleth pulled Hubert into a secluded corner, “This is Sothis’ power working through me. I, I can turn back the hands of time when I need to, when one of us falls.” Byleth looked at him and for a moment Hubert swore the professor was looking for his empathy.

Hubert listened with apprehension. While he could not ignore the physical changes the professor had undergone, it had always been difficult for him to accept the idea that she was truly the goddess incarnate. She sounded like a lunatic, and if Hubert hadn’t felt the loop himself, he would have thought as much.

“How far can you go back?” Hubert could see himself a foolish boy of ten riding after Edelgard following the Insurrection of the Seven. If he could stop things then, everything would be different.

“Usually on a few moments, sometimes minutes,” said Blyeth, shattering his hopes. “And there’s a limit to it, each time I do it the power is less and less until I can rest and rebuild my strength.”

“Have you shared this with Emperor Edelgard?”

Byleth looked at him with her giant eyes, but this time they were not judging him but pleading with him, “She of all people, she can’t know.” Byleth looked at her feet, “When something truly terrible happens, I push myself back as far as I can go.” She held up her hands as if trying to understand her impossibly strange power, “I have gone back to that day that I met her, fifteen times now? Sixteen? It’s getting difficult to keep track. All I know is that I can’t go further back than that. All of this starts when I meet the three of them in Remire.”

“You’re saying you’ve jumped back sixteen times to that day?” That was more than a lifetime spent repeating the same war over and over.

“Each time I try walking a new path, so that I can save us all,” whispered Byleth. “And each time it gets worse.” Byleth squeezed her eyes shut, “There are some I cannot save; my father dies every time, and the worst part is, I know the moment that it will happen. No matter how much I prepare myself, every time I get my hopes up that things will turn out differently, and he still manages to die. Sothis says it’s his fate.”

He could hear her anger and her hurt towards the goddess, “And Edelgard, what is her fate?”

Byleth reached up and put a hand on Hubert’s shoulder. “I know you despise me at this point because of her love for me. But know that I love her too, and that I have spent years on repeat trying to save her. But each time I turn back the clock to the beginning, if I do not walk beside her, she dies.”

Hubert felt like he’d been stabbed in the heart at those words, “How do we save her?”

“You don’t,” whispered Byleth still staring at him. “You die defending Enbarr. You hold it well for a while with Petra and Dorothea. They die one after the other, and you give it every bit of yourself so that she has time to escape. But she never leaves, and you always fall.” Byleth’s grip softened, “But when I walk beside her, you live, Hubert, ways that you cannot even imagine now. I have watched you fall in love countless times–”

Hubert broke away from Byleth’s touch. “You said she doesn’t die though if you stay with her,” Hubert felt desperate with the information. “You’re here with us now, let this be the last time.”

Byleth sighed, “There are other that die, sometimes more horribly, when I choose her.” Byleth looked up at the sky, “I have spent a lifetime in her embrace, but there are others I have loved and need to save. I will find a way to end this right.”

“Peace is a child’s dream,” hissed Hubert. “You said yourself there are those you cannot save. Maybe it’s fate that you must pick path and see it through.”

“It’s not that simple,” started Byleth.

Hubert grabbed her by the shoulders and looked down at her, “And what if I killed you now and stopped the resetting of the clock? What if when you’re removed the war is won, once and for all?” Edelgard would never forgive him and he would most certainly be executed for such treason; it would be worth it.

Byleth looked at him impassively, “Hubert, how many times do you think we’ve had this same conversation?”

He released her walked away from her then, unable to hear more.

They had rarely spoken about it since. Hubert had agreed to keep the professor’s secret if she would continue to use her power to keep the Black Eagles safe. So far, none of them had died despite facing some terrible odds. As far as how Hubert of all people, who placed the least faith into the goddess, could perceive the subtle shifts of time, Byleth suspected that heavy magic users were most sensitive to it. He had figured out that Lysithea knew, and Mercedes seemed to as well. None of them knew what to do about it and decided to keep it a secret lest their enemies discover Byleth’s power.

Hubert knew that Dorothea must be feeling it too, and she was not handling it well. He could not explain it to her, only comfort her so that she might hold on a little longer. She had told him once she felt like a rose with all its petals knocked off. He worried that she was cracking under the stress, and that eventually, she would shatter.

Dorothea sighed, pulling Hubert’s mind back to the present. “Do you ever wish we could go back to before the war?”

Hubert shook his head and then looked at her, “No.” That had been a supremely stressful time for him getting all the pieces in place for Edelgard’s coup under the watchful eyes of the church.

“It just seemed so much simpler in those days,” whispered Dorothea. “And so much easier to protect each other.” She smiled to herself, “Do you remember when you and I beat up that guy who was making fun of Lin for napping in the training grounds?”

“Lorenz,” said Hubert in best impression of the Gloucester heir. He had sided with the Empire, though he seemed less grand these days as he dealt with rebellions and famine on his lands. “We were in detention with Seteth for a while after that. I don’t even remember what we did to him.”

“You held him down while I cut his hair, and we told him only Black Eagles got to make fun of Black Eagles,” said Dorothea triumphantly. Her face fell again, “I miss the people we used to be.”

“I don’t miss who I was,” whispered Hubert. “An arrogant, friendless youth filled with self-loathing and grand ideals.” He shut his eyes, “Now I’m just another war criminal willing to work with the enemy of my enemy, even though I know that they are worse than anything I am fighting.” Hubert dreamed of the day in which he could choke the life from Lord Arundel.

“You’re not a war criminal,” said Dorothea with annoyance.

He knew she was only saying it because if he was one, she was guilty by association. “We’ll see what history has to say. I do not think it will be kind to me.” His throat was dry as he began to speak, “Edelgard was right in not wanting to come here, we aren’t gaining much by getting Brigid’s forces, and the church would be unlikely to cede it away to ally with Dagda, who has no reason to back Rhea. They could have fought and weakened each other, and we would have been fine.”

“Then why did you argue so hard against her?” demanded Dorothea.

“Because it’s Petra’s home,” said Hubert, with anger beginning to creep into his voice. “And Edelgard should value Brigid for that alone. If we don’t support those who support us, how can we expect to keep our allies?” He stopped himself before saying too much in anger. In truth, he was worried for Edelgard. She was convinced she needed to be alone at the end of all things, regardless of the family that had grown up around her in the last five years.

There was small cough from the door and Hubert was mortified to see both Petra and Ferdinand standing there. He wondered how much of the exchange they had heard.

Ferdinand raised up a tray of food, “We thought Dorothea could use some dinner and some company.”

“Nice to see you too,” said Hubert as he released Dorothea’s hand.

Ferdinand rolled his eyes, “Honestly Hubert, I am impressed you are awake so soon. It seems I have lost my bet to Caspar, he suggested that if you did not wake up, he could come yell you out of your coma.”

“I’m glad that will not be necessary,” said Hubert dryly as his eyes traced from Ferdinand to Petra.

Petra was holding a bowl and staring down at its contents. It was clear she had been crying, and knowing that he had been the source of her tears caused Hubert a deep pain.

Petra sighed and then looked at Ferdinand, “Perhaps you should be taking Dorothea to enjoy the party.” She looked now at Dorothea, “Everyone is missing you. I will sit with Hubert, I have things I must be discussing with him about the battle.”

Dorothea got up in a bit of a huff, “Fine. Discuss how he almost died because of your carelessness.”

“Dorothea, enough,” said Hubert angrily. They briefly locked eyes before Dorothea sighed with disgust and strode out past Ferdinand.

Petra set the bowl on the bedside table and took up Dorothea’s seat. Ferdinand set down the tray and excused himself to chase after Dorothea.

“You should be with your family,” said Hubert softly. He felt selfish having her all to himself when she had been waiting so long to come home.

“I am,” said Petra quietly, perhaps defiantly.

Hubert began to reach for the tray when Petra batted his hand back, “Linhardt says you must not be eating solid foods yet. I am bringing you broth.”

He quietly wondering what else was in store for him with his recovery. Now he forced himself to sit up through the pain to show her how fine he was. It felt like his insides were ripping as he did it. He’d seen people killed by gauntlets before and he was not looking forward to seeing what lay beneath his bandages.

Hubert reached towards the bowl but found his hands were still too shaky.

Petra took it and began to help. “Petra, really,” protested Hubert in embarrassment.

“I know you are not used to having people caring for you,” whispered Petra as she held the spoon. “But you cannot just be throwing yourself into the way of my harm and then also refusing my help.”

“You would have died,” said Hubert stubbornly. He couldn’t exactly tell her he’d seen it happen, he just wished she’d trust him on this.

“I am good at dodging,” protested Petra.

“Not if you can’t see it coming,” said Hubert firmly. “Trust me this was the best outcome. Your wyvern would have been brought down, and a fall from that height would have absolutely killed you.” He hated that animal with a passion and that she had chosen to abandon her training as an assassin to take to the skies, the one place he could never follow.

Petra dropped the spoon back into the bowl and looked at him angrily. He knew he had wounded her pride with his actions and his words, and Dorothea’s behavior had not helped ease that at all.

“You were supposed to be meeting my family tonight,” said Petra angrily.

“I can still do that,” started Hubert.

“No,” said Petra. Her mouth formed a grim line, “I do not think that is necessary.”

Hubert felt a strange sensation in his chest as he listened, “Are you telling me this is over?” They had been seeing each other in private for the better part of the last year. People understood they were together in some sense, but they were far more serious than they let on. This was supposed to be when she would introduce him to her family; they were planning to broach the topic of marriage with Edelgard when they got back.

Petra shut her eyes as a few tears ran down her cheeks, “You let me leave you behind to die. I do not understand how you could do that.”

“But I’m fine, and we won,” said Hubert growing defensive.

“If you are not valuing your own life,” whispered Petra. “How can you possibly value the life we would build together?”

The words lingered in his mind as he hung his head. The plans they had made, their late night whispers of what they would do when the war was done, seemed to evaporate before his eyes. “We can’t build a life together unless we win this war,” said Hubert stubbornly doubling down to defend himself. His chest felt impossibly tight, like he was having a heart attack. “I will do what I must to make that happen, even if it means risking my life.”

Petra just shook her head. She didn’t even respond, which only seemed to intensify the pain he was feeling.

Hubert felt like he was going to throw up, “Even if I have to wait until the war is done, will you at least let me try to win you back?”

“You are always speaking of the shadow war that will follow, I do not think you will ever be done fighting,” whispered Petra. “You have already promised your life to this fight, you cannot also promise it to me. I did not want to believe it, but today you showed me it was true.”

That hurt worse than the gauntlets. “You should go,” whispered Hubert. “If this is done, don’t waste any more of your time with me.”

Petra was still holding the bowl of broth, “Hubert, I will still take care of you—”

“Don’t,” he warned. His voice was beginning to break. “Don’t give me any false hope if this is your choice.”

Petra passed him the bowl with a resigned look in her eyes. After she left Hubert felt the silent warm tears rolling down his cheeks. He would have held her tighter last night if he had known what today would bring.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote the beginning of this fic back in October, and I hope this first chapter sets the tone for the rest of the story. It's not finished and updates might be slowed by the winter holiday season, but it is drafted out. 
> 
> Sorry Linhardt, there will be blood and lots of it.


	2. The Dangers of Dark Seals

Ferdinand tuned out Hubert’s petty complaining about the monotony of soup. It wasn’t Bernadetta’s fault that weeks later Hubert still couldn’t handle solid foods. She alone painstakingly prepared the tactician’s special meals after Dorothea had nearly killed him with her cooking. Ferdinand liked Bernadetta’s cooking; it was easily the best in the entire Strike Force, and he loved the secret smile he’d spied on her face while she was humming alone in the cook tent. Ferdinand had taken to dropping by just slightly too early to pick up Hubert’s meals just so he could chat with her. She seemed not to mind, and had even begun having a cup of tea at the ready for him.

“Ferdinand,” said Hubert impatiently. “Ferdinand von Aegir, are you ignoring me?”

Ferdinand sighed and looked at the grouchy mage, “I was just imagining how elated I will be when you are fully recovered.” Frankly, he found Hubert’s current appearance disquieting. Hubert’s face had seemed to hollow out on the all-soup diet, and become even more sinister looking than usual. This was not at all helped by the dark growth on his face from the days between shaves. He’d also stopped wearing his gloves, and his hands were a horrid sight.

They would soon be joining the Emperor’s main forces, much to Ferdinand’s relief. Ferdinand knew as soon as Hubert was back in Edelgard’s presence, this pathetic version of the tactician would surely be reined in. There was no possible way Hubert was going to show the Emperor his bristly face and freshly chewed up nails.

“You need to look this over and tell me if it will work,” said Hubert impatiently as he passed the battle plan to Ferdinand.

Ferdinand’s eyes glazed over as he looked at the map. Bernadetta was safely sequestered at the tree line covering Linhardt. Edelgard was charging up the center with Byleth, while Ferdinand and Caspar came up to cover either flank. “Seems good to me,” said Ferdinand with a shrug.

Hubert looked annoyed, “Good to you? This is important. If we mess this up people might die. Aren’t you going to ask where Petra and Dorothea are going to go?”

Ferdinand looked again, he supposed they were missing. “Send Petra with Caspar, and put Dorothea with me, that will be fine.”

“You’re on a horse, how is Dorothea supposed to keep up with you?”

Ferdinand felt attacked, he wasn’t a tactician, “Then Petra with me, and Dorothea with Caspar.”

“Oh so we’ll put our one battle mage in with all the brawlers, yes excellent plan Ferdinand, such a smart head hidden underneath all that ridiculous hair,” grumbled Hubert as he pulled back the battle plan and started it over.

Ferdinand let the insult stand unanswered. It took great patience, but Ferdinand knew something had happened between Hubert and Petra, and both were hurting in different ways. Petra had become weepy and isolated, while Hubert had just gotten meaner if that was even possible. Ferdinand had no idea what kind of relationship the two had shared, he just knew that it was over. Ferdinand recognized Hubert was a pathologically private person, so he dared not ask, but if Ferdinand was courting someone, he’d be singing about their love to anyone who would listen.

Hubert was holding the paper quite close to his face. Ferdinand frowned, “Have you considered you might need glasses?”

Hubert grumbled something incomprehensible under his breath. After much scratching — Ferdinand was amazed by how deplorable Hubert’s handwriting was when he rushed — the tactician had settled on a new plan. “Bernadetta should be training to be a bow knight. Then she can keep up with you, while Dorothea keeps Linhardt covered. She’ll have to improve her white magic too, we need more healers on the field.”

“Bernadetta, a bow knight?” Ferdinand was horrified by the idea of the beautiful purple haired archer so close to the front. “No, I do not think that is appropriate. She needs to be protected, not thrown into the fray.”

“Do you not think yourself capable of shielding her?” Hubert was staring at him intensely. Ferdinand was used to the acidic and dark Hubert, much like the coffee the mage was so desperately craving after Linhardt had banned him from it. Ferdinand was not used to this version of Hubert that was trusting him with the safety of the Black Eagles on the field of battle in his stead.

Ferdinand straightened up, “I am of course capable of protecting her, but I worry that she will be very frightened being so close to the front. What if she bolts and I must chase after her, leaving others exposed?”

“Give her more credit,” growled Hubert as he began to cough. Ferdinand did his best not to cringe at the coughing; it had started in the last few days and was the most awful wet rasping cough the cavalier had ever heard.

“You should really get Linhardt to check that out,” said Ferdinand as he tried to minimize the disgust in his voice.

“It’s fine,” said Hubert curtly. He cleared his throat, “You will work with Bernadetta on her horseback riding, she’s capable but needs to be better. I will work with Dorothea on her range, and I have found my replacement on the field.”

Ferdinand was delighted by the idea of being ordered to spend time with Bernadetta, but the rest of Hubert’s words troubled him. Ferdinand frowned, “Replacement? Hubert your wound is getting better.” Hubert shook his head and Ferdinand stared at the battle plan realizing why Hubert had not put himself on the map. Ferdinand felt a little nervous, “The magic has not returned.”

“It’s weak,” said Hubert as he looked at his hands. “The injury is healing fine, but something is _wrong_ , inside me.” He started to cough again as if confirming the conclusion.

“And who have you possibly found to replace you?” Ferdinand could not imagine anyone filling Hubert’s massive shoes.

“Lysithea von Ordelia,” said Hubert in a matter-of-fact way. “She will be joining us shortly.”

“Ordelia,” whispered Ferdinand remembering the young looking white haired mage. She was stationed in the old Aegir territory, overseeing something secret that Ferdinand had not been made privy to. “Is she well enough to fight?”

Hubert coughed some more, “She’s doing better than I am.” Hubert continued, “She’ll be meeting us in Enbarr, and I need you to keep Hannerman and Linhardt on their best behavior. She is not to be bothered about her crests.”

Crests. Plural. Ferdinand didn’t question it because Hubert had started to cough again, this time producing something dark in addition to all the phlegm. At first glance, Ferdinand thought it was blood, but it was too dark. Hubert stared at his handkerchief muttering “Fuck,” under his breath. He went to get up too quickly and Ferdinand watched in horror as Hubert’s eyes rolled upwards and he collapsed.

***

Edelgard had arrived to the camp by nightfall. The team was gathered around the strategy table while a heavy tension filled the tent. Petra was lingering near the entrance, as if ready to bolt at her first chance. Caspar and Dorothea were also keeping towards the periphery and looked like they didn’t want to be there. Ferdinand realized that he was supposed to be catching Edelgard up on what had happened since Brigid since Hubert was in no shape to do so. Bernadetta gave him an encouraging look that filled Ferdinand’s heart with confidence. He stood, “Right, Hubert’s condition has, worsened, but Linhardt believes he has found the source of the problem.”

Linhardt looked extremely uncomfortable as he produced the glass specimen jar. Suspended in a liquid was an evil looking black object that looked like it had been shattered. Edelgard and Hubert regarded it with a mix of concern and displeasure on their faces. “I pulled this out of Hubert in the field,” explained Linhardt. “I didn’t realize what it was at the time.”

“Fuck,” repeated Hubert. It seemed to be the only word he was capable of at the moment.

Ferdinand filled in the rest of the group, “This is a dark seal.”

“And it’s broken,” said Edelgard with extreme annoyance. She looked at Hubert and pity filled her violet eyes, “I’ll summon the dark mages.” Hubert looked up at her pleadingly but Edelgard silenced whatever he was going to say with a single look. “The broken pieces must be removed, they’re poisoning you. And if you do not get a new one right away, well, we all saw what happened to Jeritza.” There was an extremely uncomfortable silence in the tent; everyone had seen what became of Jeritza.

Mercedes, who had been standing silently beside Edelgard as her new personal guard, flinched at the reference. She had gone with Jeritza deep into the Hyrm territory just before the start of the war, and she emerged as a far different person than she had been in school. She wore plain black armor without adornment, and had sliced her hair to a short bob that fell just to her chin. She’d never struck Ferdinand as especially interested in fighting in school, but these days she wielded her scythe with a terrifying might that approached the ferocity of her late brother. Ferdinand, by complete accident, had caught sight of her bathing once and saw the great black tattoo across her back. At first he had mistaken it for wings, only to realize it was an intricate symbol much like the one that decorated Hubert’s chest.

The empress sighed, “Byleth is in charge of our battle preparations moving forward.”

This did draw a rare protest from Hubert, “I’ve been working with Ferdinand, he knows the plans for the upcoming battles. He should be in charge.”

Ferdinand was surprised by how much Hubert’s trust moved him. Edelgard flared her nostrils as she regarded Ferdinand, “Fine, for now. He will oversee those battle plans you have drafted. However, when we move towards uncharted territory, Byleth and I will work with Lord Arundel to oversee the battle plans.”

Ferdinand had never seen Hubert get mad at Edelgard in public, but she had finally found something that wounded the tactician too much for him to keep silent. “Do not trust Arundel with this.” The last time Lord Arundel had been given the role of tactician had almost cost them their lives; Edelgard’s uncle seemed to think everyone other than the Emperor was expendable. Hubert shook his head, “I will be better in time, do not bring him here.”

“I hope for our sake you are,” said Edelgard sharply. She looked at the rest of them, “Things are intensifying in Faerghus. We are not returning to Enbarr. We must march north. This may be the final phase of the war.”

Linhardt drew in an interrupting breath. Edelgard gestured at him as permission to speak. The healer winced, “And the dark seal procedure? Will Hubert return to Enbarr alone?”

“It will be done here. We cannot delay this any longer, it’s been three weeks, he doesn’t have time to go back to Enbarr.”

Edelgard was unwavering. Hubert was holding his face in his hands. Ferdinand watched the others exchanging nervous looks. This was Ferdinand’s moment, he had to be strong for them, “Of course your majesty. You and the professor should probably discuss our next move. The rest of us will ensure Hubert is looked after properly as we await the new dark seal.”

Edelgard nodded and motioned for Byleth to follow her from the tent. When the Emperor was out of earshot, things devolved into a mess of arguing.

“Does she understand the dangers of a field operation?” Demanded Linhardt furiously. “It’s risky enough in controlled conditions, but out here? Is she trying to kill you?”

“I’m going to fucking die,” said Hubert into his hands so quietly that Ferdinand only barely heard it. Bernadetta was trying unsuccessfully to console him.

Dorothea was holding Petra, who had stayed in the tent but was barely keeping herself together. Caspar was nervously pacing while muttering about the idea of Arundel being their tactician.

Ferdinand cleared his throat, trying to command their attention. No one looked at him. He frowned, “Excuse me!” No results; he channeled Hubert, “Your attention, now.” Everyone’s eyes were on him, finally. “We will get through this, we always do.” He looked at Caspar, “You need to work on the professor. Convey to her that Arundel doesn’t have the battle experience necessary to help plan our attacks.” Caspar nodded at his orders. Ferdinand now turned to Linhardt and Dorothea, “Your white magic must be top notch. You need to be on standby in case these dark mages botch anything.” He turned to Petra, “I need to you to get a message to Lysithea von Ordelia. She’s on her way to Enbarr. Plans have changed, she needs to come here. Take your wyvern, timing is of the essence.” He looked at them all again and gestured, “Go! Get to your duties, we must act fast.”

The tent cleared, leaving Hubert, Bernadetta, and Ferdinand. Ferdinand looked at the distraught tactician, “I will not pretend to know what has happened between you and Petra, but I thought it wise that she not be here when you go under the knife.”

Hubert nodded in agreement. His eyes looked heavy with resignation, “I must get my affairs in order.”

Ferdinand nodded, “I will walk Bernadetta back to her tent, to give you some time to yourself. Then, I shall stay here as long you need me.”

Ferdinand walked with Bernadetta out into the night. He suggested they go the long way to her tent, under the excuse of allowing Hubert time to process things. She suggested instead that they stop by the cook tent first, “I think I need a cup of tea,” she said sadly.

“I would like very much to join you,” said Ferdinand with a heavy heart.

Ferdinand watched as she carefully measured out the proper amount of tea leaves, “Hubert suggested you should become a bow knight. How do you feel about that?”

“A knight?” Bernadetta had stopped squeaking and squealing as much as the war went on. The timid person he had met five years ago had been replaced with someone rather confident and skilled, “I think I would like to have the extra armor, but I’m afraid I’m not very good on a horse.”

“I would help you with that,” said Ferdinand. “But you would ride by my side, towards the front of the battle, is that something you could do?”

Bernadetta pulled the boiling water from the fire. “I mean, I would be afraid, but as long as you promise not to leave me behind, I think I can do anything.” She allowed the tea to steep.

Ferdinand felt his heart swell at the sentiment. “I promise.”

Bernadetta smiled, “Then a bow knight I shall be.”

Ferdinand could not help himself as he kissed her. To his utter delight she did not pull away but rather melted into him. Him stooping, her on tip toes, their legs dangerously intertwining. Her hips seemed to rise up to his to touch and toe a forbidden line. Ferdinand stopped himself and looked at her.

She looked horrified that he had stopped, “Oh, no, you didn’t mean to kiss me? You didn’t like it!”

Ferdinand’s eyes widened, “I have been longing to kiss you. I just, I fear I may do something improper if I continue.”

“Maybe I want you to do something improper to me,” she stammered, her skin bright red with embarrassment.

Ferdinand’s loins leapt, but his noble instincts took over. His hands left her hips and took her tiny hands in his, “When we do what I think we both wish to do, we shall do so properly.” He kissed one hand, as bold as he felt he could get with her in this moment, “Bernadetta von Varely, may I have the honor of courting you?”

She nodded enthusiastically. He could get used to being the source of the smile on her face.

Ferdinand practically skipped all the way back to Hubert. He wanted to sing, to dance, to exclaim his excitement. One sight of the tactician told him that could wait. Ferdinand buried his elation and joined the grave looking mage at the table. There was once a time when they were younger that Ferdinand would have loved to rub Hubert’s face in his happiness. Now, he hadn’t the heart to punish him. A horrifying realization crept up Ferdinand’s neck, they were friends, perhaps best friends? Hubert’s favorite four letter word echoed in Ferdinand’s mind as he wondered how things had possibly come to this.

“I wrote a will,” said Hubert awkwardly as he gestured to the paper.

Ferdinand could not help himself as he stared at the messy document, “Hubert you’re the only one who can read your handwriting when you don’t take your time.”

Hubert stared at him, “Here’s the gist, I’m splitting my wealth between Caspar and Dorothea. They can do what they want.”

“Caspar and Dorothea?” Ferdinand was confused. He supposed Hubert didn’t really have any family any more, but it seemed an unexpected choice.

“They don’t have inheritances to fall back on,” said Hubert as if it were a natural conclusion. “But I stipulated that you, von Aegir, must manage the funds; they get a monthly stipend, nothing all at once. Those two morons are complete disasters when it comes to coin.”

Ferdinand had to agree with the last part, but he was still wrapping his head around Hubert’s generosity. “This is, nice?”

“Who else am I supposed to leave anything to?”

“I don’t know,” said Ferdinand defensively. “Edelgard?”

“She’s the Emperor, my wealth is like a rounding error on her royal spreadsheet,” said Hubert. “No, if I die on that table, at least I can go know that all my friends will be fine.”

“Caspar will be touched I’m sure, I don’t think you’ve ever called him your friend,” said Ferdinand as he safely folded the will away.

“Maybe I would have if he ever shut up long enough to listen,” grumbled Hubert. He drummed the table with his offensive looking finger tips, “You certainly took a long time to return Bernadetta to her tent.”

“We stopped for tea,” said Ferdinand trying to keep his excitement off his face.

“Ah a classic first date,” teased Hubert. Underneath the teasing Ferdinand could hear the bitterness of Hubert’s hurt and happiness all mixing together. Hubert laughed sullenly, “I hope I live long enough to see the wedding.”

“I hope for that too,” said Ferdinand solemnly.

***

Dorothea awoke to Linhardt of all people shaking her from her slumber. She had fallen asleep in a book. For a moment she thought she was back in the Garreg Mach library, but the alarm in Lin’s voice told her that could not be.

“They’re here, they’re starting, come on,” said Lin groggily as he pulled her from her chair.

Dorothea snapped to wakefulness at his words and followed quickly. They had been practicing all night with a spell that would at least keep Hubert safely sedated during the procedure. It required a constant cast though, and Linhardt and Dorothea would have to trade off to maintain it. Lin took the first shift while Dorothea tried to speak soothingly to Hubert as he went out. It was hard to watch him as they tied him down and put a bit in his mouth to prevent him from chomping off his own tongue. Edelgard held his hand until he had faded into his magically induced sleep.

His body was a wreck, a great big map of scars that told a story of a violent past and uncertain future. Dorothea choked back her own nausea as the dark mage began to cut from Hubert’s sternum all the way down to his groin. It was a shallow slice, just enough to get into his guts. They then spread the skin apart with awful little forks on chains. It was the most terrible thing Dorothea had ever seen and she was horrified at the familiarity in Edelgard’s own eyes as she watched unwaveringly.

Lin’s eyes were squeezed shut as he continued to whisper the spell. Dorothea watched the tears escaping him as he listened to the sounds of the surgery. It was horrid watching them probe around and pull out bits of dark seal. They continued until the seal appeared as complete as possible.

Dorothea stepped in to take over as Lin ran from the tent to vomit. Dorothea could not close her eyes as the fresh glimmering black dark seal was removed from its case. With great big forceps the mages carefully inserted it into two layers of muscle that made up the wall of Hubert’s abdomen. They closed him slowly and deliberately with magic she had never seen before, and Dorothea let herself breath a sigh of relief. Hubert was still alive.

“He has to be awake for this part,” ordered the dark mage in charge.

Dorothea felt her stomach clench as she nodded as allowed the spell to fade away. Hubert’s breathing changed from slow and still to panicked and rapid as his green eyes opened. He squinted at the light and began to pull against his restraints, “Not again,” he whispered fervently.

Edelgard shut her eyes and hung her head. Dorothea put her hands gently on either side of Hubert’s face, “Look at me, not at them.” She locked him into her stare so that he couldn’t watch the mages ritualistically cutting the magic circle into his side. Tears ran down from the corners of his eyes and onto her fingers. She had never seen Hubert cry before. It terrified her to see him reduced to this. The strongest member of their team, the mast they all clung to in the storm, was broken.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey Mercedes is back! Yay?


	3. The Masks We Wear

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How the personas of Dark Knight Mercedes and Lord Vestra were shaped

Hubert’s cot was not comfortable. Dorothea held him as he shook following the procedure. It was still early spring and the air was cold but Hubert was sweating and warm as he pulled through his body readapting to having a functioning dark seal inside it. The tremors had lessened as the hours passed but violent jolts would seize him at random.

“I want Petra, but I’ve made her not want me,” said Hubert in a small and aching voice that made her heart hurt for him.

“She might come around,” said Dorothea as she hugged him gently. Petra _was_ coming around, even though consensus around camp was that it was never going to work out because Petra was wonderful and Hubert was, well Hubert. 

“She shouldn’t,” whispered Hubert. “I’m as poisonous as this dark seal they put in me.”

“Don’t say that, please,” begged Dorothea as she ran her fingers through his hair. As the war progressed, the Strike Force had shared a fun game of ‘find Hubert’s gray hairs and pluck them out’. He was always in a bad mood over it but the rest of the group was having a wonderful time catching him unaware and claiming a dangerously won silvery trophy. It had not been as funny when Hubert triumphantly pulled one of Dorothea’s grays from her head. They stopped playing soon after that and now Hubert’s head was streaked with strands of premature silver. There weren’t too many, but there were still far more than a man his age should have.

She traced the new scars he’d gotten since the last time they’d been this close. It had been many years and many partners since the last time she had found herself in bed with Hubert. The beginnings of the war had collided them together. It was purely physical; after a good battle they celebrated and after a bad one they consoled each other. Sometimes it was just making a boring patrol more exciting, while sometimes during a battle it was deep kiss as they hid behind some barricade. Hubert always laughed too confidently after that, and promised to see her on the other side before dashing out ahead to clear a path through the danger they faced. It was easy; they both got their physical release and there wasn’t any mess about feelings or expectations for anything more.

It had stopped when Edelgard had finally built up the courage to court Dorothea, who had enthusiastically accepted without fully considering what it meant to be the consort of the Emperor. That had been a thrilling romance but Edelgard could never belong to a single person, not completely. Edelgard was the Emperor, she belonged to Adrestia, and with that came a whole world Dorothea was inept at navigating. Hubert had helped her, for it was literally part of his official duties to manage imperial consorts, but his emotional support was limited because he was emotionally limited.

Unfortunately though, it was clear over time that Dorothea was merely stepping in for someone missing. Byleth was presumed dead but she had never really left Edelgard’s deeply reserved heart. Try as she might, Dorothea never found a firm footing in Edelgard’s affections. The relationship was dead in the water long before Byleth came back. It had been the most painful loss of love that Dorothea had ever endured, and it killed her to see Edie act so unaffected in public. Dorothea felt tossed to the side, another casualty of war. By the time she had come up for air, Hubert had moved on into his first real relationship and wasn’t there to catch her. Dorothea had been treading water ever since, and was desperate for someone to pull her up to safety.

Here they were again, together and yet utterly alone. Dorothea dared to softly kiss Hubert on the neck. It was all she could think of to communicate that she was here, and so desperately craving comfort too. “Don’t,” he whispered.

Lord Arundel entered the tent and gave Dorothea a sharp glare, “Get out.”

Dorothea hesitated but Hubert practically pushed her, “Just go.” She quickly exited the tent, but snuck around to eavesdrop. It was a little difficult to pick a place, she had to make sure the sun wasn’t illuminating her shadow against the canvas. Dorothea quickly crammed herself into a space between a few water barrels and began to listen while Arundel began to verbally lay into Hubert.

“I used to believe you might be worthy of our gifts,” said Arundel. His voice was full of contempt. “You seemed so singular in your purpose. Your eyes were so keen to see the weapon in everything, and your creativity astounded even me. Your lack of remorse is legendary. When you were willing to kill your own father for the Emperor, well, I was convinced her faith in you was finally earned.” He paused, sucking in a disappointed breath, “But now I see you are no different from the rest of the surface dwellers; weak, and undeserving of our secrets.”

Dorothea strained to hear if Hubert was responding. He seemed to just be taking Arundel’s lecture in silence. The lord continued, “You’re supposed to be guiding her, keeping her focused, not saving these pathetic fools you think are your friends. You don’t have friends.”

Arundel was pacing the tent, “You have been given a second chance only because the Emperor demanded it, but even she cannot command a third. Do not waste this.” Dorothea edged to peer in through where the seams of the tent met and could just make out Arundel clutching Hubert by the shoulders, practically spitting in the tactician’s face, “Your objective is eliminating Rhea, not rescuing your little whore’s worthless island.”

“Brigid is a strategic location,” said Hubert in a quiet voice. “And she’s not my _whore_.” With the last bit, a touch of Hubert’s old venom had seeped back in filling Dorothea with a strange hope.

Arundel’s lip curled, “You think I don’t know what goes on in this camp? I know who you’re sleeping with, who you’re not sleeping with. You used to be so careful, so private. For so long I thought you only had eyes for our dear Emperor. Now that she takes that green haired monstress to bed, you fancy yourself free to wander.” He released Hubert and regarded him as if looking at the shit on his shoes, “Don’t let those fools distract her or you, or I will begin to eliminate them.” Arundel folded his arms, “I’ll begin with that orange haired fop you put in charge.”

Hubert was staring at the ground, “I will focus. There will be no more distractions.”

Arundel snorted, “Good.”

Hubert’s eyes traced up to the regent, “But should you continue to threaten or dare to harm the others, my focus will turn to you. You said you were impressed by my creativity, my lack of remorse, these are things you will come to fear.”

“Watch yourself Vestra,” warned Arundel. “You are replaceable.”

Hubert stood so that he could look down at Arundel. His hand traced over the freshly stitched dark seal as his tongue ran along his teeth like knife along a throat, “You went to great pains to restore me. You would not even do that for poor Jeritza, a far more lethal servant. No Thales, I do not believe you think I am replaceable.” He gestured to the flap of the tent, “You’ve made your point, I understand what is required. Now get the hell out.”

Dorothea watched the disagreeable regent retreat. She watched as Hubert collapsed back onto the cot as soon as Arundel was gone. When a safe amount of time had passed she returned to him.

“You can’t be in here,” he said heatedly.

“I heard the entire thing, what is he asking of you --”

“You shouldn’t eavesdrop on me, you’ll hear dangerous things,” warned Hubert as he struggled to sit back up. She hadn’t heard him so angry in a long time.

“Hubie,” started Dorothea. “This isn’t something you should face alone, I can help you with this.”

“Help me by staying the hell away from me and encouraging everyone else to do the same,” he growled. 

Dorothea swallowed uneasily, “And if I won’t?”

“Then I’ll find ways to keep you away,” threatened Hubert. “You won’t like them, and you may never forgive me. So do me a favor and don’t push me.” He stood, staggering a bit and started to get dressed in his black uniform.

“You need to rest,” protested Dorothea.

“Have you listened to nothing I’ve said? _Go_ ,” his voice was seething but his expression was broken.

Dorothea felt blindsided as she walked out of the tent.

***

Once upon a time, a father had challenged his reluctant son to a duel. The father wished to die honorably, rather than charged for crimes that would have him publicly shamed and executed. The son killed his father, and as a reward was given his title, the Marquis von Vestra.

The son did not want that title; to him, those words would always reference his father, who had stained the title and twisted what it meant. Instead the son dropped the frivolous von that implied ownership of a territory, for his domain was darkness and no one owned that, and dropped the title of Marquis. A Marquis was not as important as a Duke, but a little more important than a Count. The son did not feel very good about nobility and rankings, and instead slipped down the ladder to something generic that suited him. Lord. Lord Vestra accepted his title humbly and continued on serving his Emperor to the best of his frightening abilities.

Lord Vestra was well known as a very cold person who killed with a snap of his gloved fingers. He loved only one person, his Emperor, and for her he would do quite literally anything. Lord Vestra sat at meetings with Agarthans and said and did things they approved of. He lived in the shadows. Lord Vestra was unsettlingly observant, a rumored spy master, and acted as judge and executioner when someone stepped out of line. Lord Vestra enjoyed looking scary and threatening people. When he made jokes, it was only at others expenses. Lord Vestra tortured people to the point they begged him to kill them. The only people who didn’t fear Lord Vestra were the ones who hadn’t heard of him yet.

Then there was Hubert. Hubert grew up reading classic dramas and delighted in having young princess Edelgard ask him to read the heroes' monologues aloud to her, but would read the villains' parts when she wanted him to. Hubert played cello and liked sitting through long operas. Hubert slept with a stuffed pegasus named Peggles, that sadly was currently hundreds of miles away safe in Enbarr when Hubert needed it most. He bit his nails. Hubert wanted people to like him, and was painfully aware of how much they did not. He wore a small embroidered flower to get one person to be less afraid of him. He avoided mirrors because he did not like the way he looked, and died inside when people teased that it was because he had no reflection because he had no soul. He knew people found him and his work dull and depressing so he avoided talking about himself or what he enjoyed. He had never had a birthday party thrown for him, and would never presume to plan one for himself lest no one come. Hubert enjoyed drinking a warm mug of coffee while making pointless word puzzles for others to solve, and lying naked in bed against the body of another. Hubert loved that he had friends who called him Hubie, even though it was a stupid silly nickname. This was Hubert, a man who loved his best friend and would die for her.

Hubert was anxious about rejection, highly self conscious, and constantly ashamed. Lord Vestra didn’t hate Hubert, but he pitied him and thought it best if he stayed hidden and therefore protected. So Lord Vestra swept Hubert up in his billowing dark cloak and kept him safely tucked away deep inside until someone broke down his carefully built defenses and Hubert broke free. Right now, the war was ramping up and Hubert needed to go away so that Lord Vestra could finally get to business and put an end to all this shit.

***

Looking at Petra was like feeling his wounds pulled open stitch by stitch and so Hubert mostly studied the ground when she was near. The voice in his head, the one he swore for so many years was his father’s, had turned out to be only him all along. Now Lord Vestra whispered to him softly, _“Please Hubert, let me handle this situation. Let me remove this feeling from you.”_

He had never been one for things, and so it was simple to get his belongings from her tent because all he ever left was a pair of wool socks for especially cold nights when his feet extended past the bottom of her bed, and the pencil and paper he’d stashed away so he could write her little coded love notes when he inevitably got up before she woke up. Getting her stuff out of his tent was much more tedious once he was well enough to get to it. Every time he was certain he had surely gotten all evidence of her gone, there was something else that popped up to mock him.

So Lord Vestra had gotten the unpleasant task of systematically pulling apart his tent in search of the seditious evidence of Petra that threatened to ruin his day if found. The pillow she preferred, technically his, but so entrenched with her scent that it sent Hubert into a panic the first night he’d accidentally used it, was put in the lost and found and quickly snapped up by Linhardt. The Brigid style wood carving of a pegasus that was as beautiful as it was painful to behold was passed along to the person who cared for the imperial war animals. He tossed the little bits of pigment she sometimes used to mix up war paint out with the memory of the really magical evening she had spent painting him with it in places war paint probably didn’t need to go. She shed like crazy apparently because there was an endless supply of long purple hairs caught up in everything: his clothes, his bedding, even between pages of books. Lord Vestra scoffed and wondered how she wasn’t bald with all the hair she left behind. Anything he could find of her was rooted out, given back, given away, or destroyed completely. The only thing he kept was the knife she’d given him because Lord Vestra was practical and it was a very good blade for killing with.

Petra seemed to think that they still had more to talk about after how they’d left things in Brigid, but dodging her was easy. “Hubert, do you think we could be talking about—”

Lord Vestra often cut her off, “Sorry, I’m busy,” or “There’s nothing to speak about,” and the very worst, “I cannot imagine you have anything to say worth hearing.” Yet she persisted through his deflections; her sadness gave way to anger, to bargaining, then acceptance that he was going to be like this. Good. Now she was finally seeing who he had been all along. Lord Vestra was content with this; Hubert buried himself more deeply and avoided surfacing at all.

However, even Lord Vestra was limited when it came to controlling his subconscious. In his dreams, he and Petra danced on a knife’s edge as his actions threatened to push them off. The ones where they died together in Enbarr were bad but manageable. The sex dreams were predictable if not a little trite. It was the one about their future that was becoming a nightmare. In this dream they shared a house in Nuvelle and led separate and demanding political lives in Enbarr and Brigid. Yet when they came together to that wonderful home all the stress faded away and just left them with each other, and eventually their ever growing brood of beautiful children. That was the dream that always sent Hubert reeling with it’s vividness. It was like he was glimpsing another Hubert’s life, one that might have been, but not this time. That was the most painful dream about Petra. It was the one he had always looked forward to when they were together, and now the one he feared the most. That was the reason Lord Vestra started mixing up a powerful cocktail of sleeping potions each night so that Hubert would no longer dream about anything at all.

***

Once upon another time, there was a little girl born after her father died. She bore the crest of Lamine, and her name was Mercedes. Soon after her came her little half brother Emile von Bartels. She was his big sister, though she was not actually all that much bigger, and she loved him. When her wicked step father started to comment about her barely matured body, especially those ripe child bearing hips, her mother got afraid for Mercedes. Her mother made a hard choice and spirited Mercedes away from danger, but at the cost of having to leave Emile behind.

Mercedes cried a lot and prayed to the goddess for forgiveness for looking the way she did and how she inspired such evil in men’s hearts.

Mercedes continued to grow up into an exceptionally lovely young woman. She was raised in a church but she learned quickly that even in a holy place not all hearts were pure. Her step father was dead, but other men filled his place and kept commenting on her round hips and shapely breasts. Mercedes begged the goddess to take them away, but they just got bigger. So Mercedes started to wear a shawl to hide them, and nice wide draping skirt so that no one could tell what lay beneath it. She got better at reading people so she could sort good from bad, and she got tough for when the bad slipped through and tried to touch what she didn’t want them to. Mercedes decided that she needed to learn how to protect herself, and enrolled in a school for sorcery. She mostly learned to heal, but she also learned how to deal damage.

Girls at school didn’t like Mercedes very much because boys at school liked her a little too much. But, then she met Annie, and Mercedes became Mercie. Annie didn’t stare at Mercie’s breasts with lust or jealousy. She looked at Mercies heart and made it warm.

Mercie loved school and eventually got all the way to Garreg Mach where she found the most wonderful group of friends. She became the primary healer of the group, and they were a house that carried a deep hurt inside them for her to work on. She was older than them, and they treated her like their big sister, like their mom, which Mercie loved dearly. Mercie liked helping people and telling ghost stories, baking sweets, and singing hymns. Then Mercie found Emile again, but he wasn’t Emile anymore. He said his name Jertiza, and he wore a mask that completely covered Emile.

Jertiza was cold, mysterious, and a killer. Jeritza worked for awful people and did his job exceptionally well. So well in fact, that they would not even release their slave upon his death. When Mercie saw this she knew she had to rescue her brother, but to do that she had to walk his path. Someone who understood the creatures that controlled Jeritza better than her tried to dissuade her, but that person didn’t know what it meant to have family, and so Mercie persisted.

She walked his path all the way to the Hrym territory and beyond it to a dark place deep in the hills. Jertiza took off his mask, but only for her, to show her that Emile was still buried deep inside. Then Jeritza put his mask back on and taught her how to do the same. So Mercie, the fun girl who liked helping others and sharing tea and sweets, got safely enveloped inside Mercedes' hardening shell. She still had those shapely breasts and the pesky wide hips that turned heads, even in the darkness of Shambhala. No one was fool enough to make an unwanted move on the Death Knight’s sister, but Mercedes had a feeling Jertiza was more vulnerable than he let on.

So Mercedes cut her beautiful hair off. She covered her body not with flowing shawls and dresses but with steel. She kept her healing magic, and her hurting magic, and she decided she’d go a step further. She got a dark seal and it was beyond the worst pain she’d ever known. It was worth it for the devastation she could now deal. She rode out with her brother and kept him from dying. She killed a lot of people. Mercedes got a reputation, and no one wanted to touch her now. Then Jeritza fell and he wasn’t resurrected again; the Agarthans had found a suitable replacement for him.

Lord Vestra called Mercedes Ms. von Matritz and was the most polite person to her in the entire army. He never flinched at the sight of blood on her hands because he had liters more of it all over him. When they stared into each others cold dead eyes they saw the masks that others had no idea they were wearing.

As the war dragged on, Lord Vestra had made a small comment one day as Mercedes put on her armor and picked up the plain helmet she wore in the field, “Sometimes, when we wear masks they serve to protect us, but they also block out a lot light from getting in.”

“I can see perfectly fine,” whispered Mercedes, uncertain if he meant her literal armor or her metaphorical mask. “I see you for what you are, _Hubert_.”

“I know Ms. von Matritz,” he said with his barely there smile, “Just from one kindred spirit to another, make sure you take off that mask once in a while and check that there’s still something there to protect. Wear one too long and you’ll become an empty shell.” She took his point. Jertiza had stayed Jertiza too long, and Emile had slowly disappeared until he was no more. Mercedes hadn’t listened to Hubert once and it had led her down a futile path of pain and anguish. She decided this time she’d try out his advice.

So Mercedes still prayed as a means of letting her mask off. She prayed for strength, she prayed for end to the war. She prayed that Mercie could come out and live free again.

***

Hubert had never gotten Petra an engagement ring, which he immensely regretted, but they had exchanged knives. A nice practical gesture for two practical assassins. Petra had given him a magnificent Brigid style hunting knife, serrated and hooked at the end. When he made a kill it was all for his Emperor, but when he killed with that blade it was a secret kill in the name of his Queen, and one more step towards ensuring a future they could share. It was beautiful and deadly, just like her, and he had no plans of returning it.

Yet here she was presenting him with the cold and thin stiletto he’d gifted to her. “Please, take it back,” she said. It had never really complimented her style; it was meant for staying hidden until the last second before a strike, but Petra did not enjoy wearing lots of clothing.

When the war started she had shed her Garreg Mach uniform and eschewed the imperial uniform in favor of her culture’s clothing. She wanted to be recognized for what she was, a princess of Brigid. She chose to be here with them, unlike when she was sent to Garreg Mach. Therefore, she was also going to choose what she wore. Now she was choosing not to keep the knife that represented him, the stupid thin blade that had never suited her in the first place.

“It was a gift, why would I want it back?” said Lord Vestra coldly without looking up from his paperwork.

“What do you expect me to be doing with it?”

Lord Vestra shrugged, “Killing.” He glanced up at her impassively, “Give it to someone else if you don’t want it.”

“But, a gift you are giving to me cannot just be given to someone else,” she protested.

“It doesn’t mean anything anymore,” said Lord Vestra as he returned his eyes to his missives. “I’m not giving yours back, it’s a good knife.”

Petra frowned at him. “You are doing this thing you always do when you want people to stay away, where you are being a miserly dastard,” said Petra knowingly, in an almost forgiving way like he wasn't choosing to be this horrible person on purpose. 

Lord Vestra faded at that, and Hubert could not help but laugh sadly despite himself. “It’s _miserable bastard_ Petra,” he whispered.

“Yes that is what I was saying,” she snapped.

For all her improvements to speaking in the last five years there were still things she hadn’t mastered. “No, you said I’m a miserly dastard, but I’m a miserable bastard.”

“Maybe you are being both,” she suggested as she tucked the stiletto away into the little holster on her thigh.

“Come here, please,” whispered Hubert. She didn’t hesitate as she came to his chair and let him hold her. He'd stand up if he could, but right now he was too weak so he had to do with sitting. Hubert brushed his face along her front and kissed the space below her breasts gently. Her arms draped over his shoulders and her hands held his head. It was so tempting to just take her back and lie, telling her that he could be who she wanted. Yet he loved her too much to string her along. They had no future together. He had tried being cold to drive her away, and it hadn’t worked, now he was going to try being honest.

He looked up at her longingly and sorrowfully as his arms wrapped around her. “I thought I could give you my life, but I was wrong. If I had two, one would certainly belong to you, but as it stands, I’m afraid I only have the one, and I pledged it to this war long before I met you.”

What they had said to each other before in Brigid was a mere soft break, a harbinger of this hard stop to what they had. Hubert kissed her body again, trying to commit everything about her to memory. Her warmth, her smell, and her softness, “I cannot stand in the light beside you, and I cannot father your children, because I cannot promise to be there to raise them.” His body ached to be back inside her one last time, and he had fantasized more than once about just filling her with proof of their union and sending her home, away from this war and to safety. He wanted nothing more than to see her swelling with their child inside her, but that was never going to be. He kissed her on her flat little stomach now and prayed that someday she found a man who could give her the family she craved and the devotion she deserved.

“I need to see this war through, till the true end, and it’s not going to be over any time soon. You can’t wait around for me, because there might not be anything left when all is said and done,” he whispered into her chest. Even if they defeated the church soon, the war against the Agarthans was going to drag on for decades, and he’d be lucky to survive it.

He could feel her body tensing up as he spoke his truths. Yet Petra’s voice was strong, she was done with shedding tears over him, “I am knowing this too, though I am wishing it was not true.”

“ _My Queen_ ,” he whispered in her native tongue as he kissed her body one last time.

“My lamplighter” she retorted. It was a strange pet name that had come to her when they were strolling one evening in Enbarr as dusk fell and the lamplighters came out to illuminate the street. Petra had never seen Hubert as hiding in the shadows. She insisted that he was the one willing to go through the darkness so that everyone else could enjoy more light. When he disagreed she had sighed and said, “I wish you could be seeing yourself through my eyes.”

Hubert now pulled the beloved knife she had given him free from it’s holder, “When I kill the Agarthans, I’ll use this as often as I can. I’ll spill their blood with it as retribution for destroying what we should have had.” That was the only promise he had left to give her that he could actually keep.

“And people are saying you cannot be romantic,” sighed Petra in an empty tease before she kissed the top of his head. They released each other and stared at each other sadly.

“Please,” whispered Hubert as he re-sheathed the knife. “Please find someone who can commit themselves to you and you alone.”

Petra swallowed back whatever she was going to say and nodded. This was really over, and they both understood this wasn’t a fight to make up from. He watched her walk from the tent and felt the warmth she’d lent him fading away. This hurt was merely another scar to carry, but instead of on his body, it was on his soul. Lord Vestra sighed and sealed Hubert away once more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I loved Petra and Hubert's support chain and ending. I'm pretty sure it's the only one that explicitly makes Hubert a dad (and one of the few that makes Petra a mom). I picture them with a bunch of wild, noisy children, and Hubert grumbling threats about putting monsters back under their beds if they don't go to sleep soon as he steps on legos and tries not to curse while Petra laughs at him from bed. 
> 
> I did not love when Edelgard low-key mentioned how Hubert suggested Petra should be assassinated in her and Petra's supports; I feel like that would be a huge blowup between Petra and Hubert later.
> 
> Also in a game of terrible fathers, I believe Mercedes step dad might just be the worst/tied with Bernadetta's.


	4. Prisoners of War

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There is a spy in their camp that must be found and dealt with.  
> The Imperial Forces go to gather in Garreg Mach, and a prisoner exchange starts to get planned. We learn the creepy business Lysithea has been up to.

Lord Vestra’s loyalty was not in question, not from the Empire, not from their opposition. He had shown himself to be willing to punish defiance of Edelgard’s orders from that first battle in the crypt when Metody had declared that none would be spared after Edelgard had pledged to protect the students and only go after members of the church. Lord Vestra hadn’t even given Metody the chance to retract his words before felling him and seamlessly taking over command of his forces. He treated deserters with similar swift execution, and had established himself as the person to fear if you had doubts about your orders or position in the Imperial Army.

So right now as Dorothea watched Lin doing his daily healing session of Hubert’s wounds while the once feared general was reduced to silent tears of private pain, she was consumed with worry. She had the morning report of how many soldiers had gone missing, fleeing, in the night. “We’re down approximately two more battalions.” People weren’t quite as afraid of Lord Vestra as he needed them to be, and they were taking their chance to run.

Hubert grunted, although it was difficult to tell if he was reacting to the news or to Lin prodding his side. Dorothea bit her lip, “There’s something else, the church has sent you a letter.”

“To me personally?” demanded Hubert. “Have you read it?”

“I would not dream of opening your post without permission,” said Dorothea as she produced the letter. Knowing Hubert he’d have some blinding hex to punish someone who dared to pilfer through his letters.

Hubert looked at her impatiently, “Just read it.” Dorothea glared at him, he was still being an asshole. Any time he interacted with the members of the Strike Force it was only for official business, the rest of his time he spent with Edelgard or alone. However even stupid fearsome Lord Vestra couldn’t heal himself, and Dorothea knew she’d have his captive attention when he came each day to the infirmary area. She had decided she would be his eyes and ears in the places he couldn’t go in this camp. People shut up when cranky curmudgeonly Lord Vestra came around, but people _loved_ to gossip with saucy fun Dorothea. It was the only way she knew how to help him. 

Dorothea broke the seal and scanned the letter, “Dear Lord Vestra, congratulations on your unexpected recovery. Not even a broken dark seal can seem to kill you,” she paused as her brow furrowed, “How does Seteth even know about that?”

“Because he has spies in our camps,” said Hubert irritably. “And they’re feeling bold.” He sat up when Lin was done and painfully pulled his shirt back on to obscure the terrible scars along his torso. He looked up at Dorothea and sighed, “They’re good at catching our people, we haven’t been as good at filtering out theirs.”

Dorothea didn’t like the sound of that at all. She gave a quick look at Lin, who often zoned out during these little chats but will still a risk to expose too much information to, and chose her words carefully, “Have you heard anything from our friend in the field?”

“Not since before Brigid,” said Hubert. Dorothea had noticed that Hubert’s life had quickly become events _Before Brigid_ and _After Brigid_. “I think it’s been at least four months since our last correspondence. So he’s either underground, dead, or captured, none of which is very helpful.”

Dorothea sincerely hoped Felix was not dead. She had gone from utterly hating him, to tolerating him when it was clear he was choosing the Empire, to regularly sparring with him whenever he was around. However, as much as Felix wanted to stay in the Empire, he was one of their few native Kingdom assets. So he had returned to his homeland and became a spy.

Near the start of the war, Hubert had nearly convinced Dorothea to go spy in the Kingdom for him. She had always been extremely popular in school, and to go join other friends and act like the Empire was her enemy would not be much of a challenge. However before Dorothea could make her choice, Edelgard had decided she much rather preferred Dorothea close by, and that idea never came to pass. As the war progressed and Dorothea heard about spy after spy captured and hung in the Kingdom territories, she was very glad she had stayed put. Now it was clear that the church had gotten someone deep inside their camp, and Dorothea and Hubert were desperate to figure out who it was.

“How many people do we have in the kingdom right now?”

“Not enough, but I’m about to send one more,” smiled Hubert darkly. Dorothea winced at his expression, she felt a little sorry for the person about to receive those orders.

***

Hubert still felt incredibly tired and ill as he pulled up his stool in front of Hilda’s pen. She pulled her pink head up to glare at him, “You look like shit.”

“Good morning to you too Hilda,” said Lord Vestra with as much civility as he could muster.

She cocked her head and forced a smile, “I heard you died. Pity that rumor wasn’t true.”

“You can’t kill someone who was never really alive to begin with,” said Lord Vestra as he folded his arms. “Did you miss my visits?”

“No,” said Hilda sourly as she shivered. With everything happening he had not seen Hilda since the weeks following her initial capture.

He hated that she was here. She should be in Enbarr under house arrest somewhere nice, not kept like cattle in this chilly open air prison. It was the decent thing to do, but unfortunately the war was at a point where decency had fallen away and Hilda Goneril was nothing more than a political weapon waiting to be used. Hubert sighed as he got up and took off his cape. He offered it to her.

“I don’t want your stupid cape, I’d rather stay cold,” she said. Her eyes had a deadened look to them. She’d been captured months ago and since then she’d been moved across Fodlan with the main body of the imperial army. She was still wearing what she’d been in when they captured her in Derdriu. She wouldn’t take an imperial uniform, and that was all they had to offer. Lord Vestra was disappointed that the people he’d left in charge of managing the prisoners of war were not doing a remotely passable job. Someone was getting fired later.

“Good news, we’ll be moving you, again,” said Lord Vestra.

“Oh wonderful,” laughed Hilda as she casually leaned back against the bars and put her arms behind her head as if she were relaxing on a fun romp through Fodlan instead of being drug along like chattel.

“And Emperor Edelgard has finally decided what to do with you,” said Lord Vestra. That seemed to get Hilda's attention.

“Please, don’t keep me on the edge of my seat,” she smiled as she crossed her legs lazily.

“She wants me to marry you, to force your brother’s hand,” said Lord Vestra. Hubert felt as about thrilled about the prospect as Hilda looked. Yet he tried to look as if the idea was not so bad.

“I think I’d rather be executed,” announced Hilda as her posture changed and she balled up again.

“But think of the children Hilda,” smiled Lord Vestra with a deranged level of fake excitement. “My looks, your strength, they’ll be monsters!” Hilda would easily kill him with her bare hands before any arranged marriage could possibly be consummated. She was a strong lady and a flight risk; her cell was warded so she could not pry the bars apart like last time.

Lord Vestra ran his tongue along his teeth as he stared at her. He wanted to know if she would break, would she plead with him to stop this? Was she going to beg? Or would she get down on her knees and take it? Lord Vestra knew Hilda was a lot more complex than her cutesy demeanor would suggest.

Hilda maintained her cool stare and Lord Vestra decided he had other things to do today so he’d get to the point, “I would much prefer to trade you for a prisoner in the Kingdom, but I will need your cooperation.”

“When I was captured, the Alliance and the Kingdom weren’t really getting along,” mused Hilda as she stared at her nails and tried to remove some of the dirt beneath them. They used to be painted and freshly manicured all the time at school. Now she didn’t even get the courtesy of clippers. She jeered at Hubert, “Marrying you might actually be a preferable option.” She blew him a kiss and winked.

“They’ll be nicer to you than I will,” promised Lord Vestra.

Hilda was looking to the side now of her unfortunate prison with a glum expression, “I’m not so sure about that.” She looked back at him and hardened her stare, “So who are you trying to trade me for?”

“A friend of mine,” said Hubert flatly.

“Oh Hubie,” she cooed in her annoying way. “You don’t have friends.”

Hubert sighed and put his hand in his pockets. He produced the little kit, “This is a gift for you.”

Hilda’s eyes narrowed with suspicion, “Poison for me to take perhaps?”

Hubert got the other part of the gift, a basin of water that he warmed with a basic fire spell. He slid it all of it on a tray into the cell through the little gap used to deliver her food. Hilda looked at him like he was letting a rabid rodent loose in her cell with her. Hubert sighed, “It’s so you can do your nails.”

She looked at the tray and looked up at him. For a while she didn’t move, then she made her way over and opened it up. There was a file, though not one good enough for getting through metal bars, and nothing too sharp or stabby. The shade of nail polish he chose, of which pickings were slim these days, was as close to her pink hair as he could get. For the first time since her captivity, Hubert saw a real smile grace Hilda’s lips even if only for a split second. She looked at him dubiously, “Why?”

“Consider yourself officially being courted Hilda Goneril,” laughed Lord Vestra with a bow before he left her to it and got on with the rest of his day. He had no interest in Hilda whatsoever but even cold Lord Vestra had to admit from time to time it was nice to make someone happy for once instead of dead.

***

Felix didn’t want to be rehabilitated. He wanted to go home. It wasn’t his fault that his captors didn’t understand that where ‘home’ was had changed for him. It wasn’t a place anymore, it was a person, and she wasn’t here.

His choice had been to kill Sylvain or get captured, which was never really much of a choice at all. So Felix had relented, let himself get captured by his old pals, and now he sat in the dungeons of Fhirdiad while the kingdom of Faerghus and the church rallied their forces for the final push to end the war. He was supposed to be back on his way to Enbarr, but here he was instead, stuck like an animal in a cage.

Annette visited often. So often that Gilbert was now lecturing her on not confusing prisoners for friends. She just wanted to know how Mercedes was doing when he last saw her. She missed Mercie so much it hurt him and he was tempted to try to sway her to escape with him and defect to the Empire. She’d never do it.

Sylvain and Ingrid came by as often as they could. They even brought by their kid, Glenn, to meet him. Felix wanted to know what irresponsible morons brought their baby with them into a war zone. Rodrigue came every single goddess damn day. Dimitri did not come by as often, but here he was now flanked by Gilbert and Dedue.

Gilbert had successfully sent Annette running away from the dungeon. Now he and the king were coming to show Felix something. Great.

“To what do I owe this pleasure?” asked Felix with an especially mad stare.

“They’ve finally discovered you were captured,” sighed Gilbert as he held up a letter. Felix didn’t have to squint at the seal impression to figure out who had sent it; black wax was Vestra. “They’re proposing a prisoner exchange.”

Felix wondered who the hell they could possibly be trading for him. Who was left? Felix folded his arms and settled into a deep frown as he waited for someone to get to the point.

Dimitri sighed at Felix’s defiant silence, “They’re offering Hilda Goneril in exchange for you.”

Felix could not help himself, “So when am I going home?”

Gilbert looked disappointed, “Please do not express that sentiment in front of your father.”

Felix just spat on the ground. It was one of his last weapons; they’d taken away everything but his voice and his ability to gleek in their direction. He’d been gone from Lysithea almost two years at this point. Over a year spent sneaking across borders and spying, and three months in this cage. He was sick of losing precious time with her. Felix leaned his head back against the wall of his cell, “Do you want Goneril or not?”

“We have not made a decision yet,” said Dimitri. “The Archbishop is concerned it’s a trap.”

A message from Vestra a trap? Who knew the Archbishop was so sharp. Felix wanted out of his cell, “Any idea what they’ll do with her if you won’t trade?”

Gilbert made a very disgusted face, “Vestra is threatening to marry her.”

Felix burst out laughing despite himself. Hubert had not come up with that idea, that was the only thing Felix was sure of. Hubert was a bit of a masochist, but to marry Hilda, surely he didn’t hate himself that much.

“This is no laughing matter,” warned Dimitri. “Think of poor Hilda, she was our classmate, she doesn’t deserve that.” Dedue was nodding his head in silent agreement.

Felix dried his eyes, “Well, there are worse tortures than marrying Vestra.” Like being stuck in a Fhirdiad cell. Felix would marry Hubert in a heartbeat if meant he was free. He’d consummate it and everything just to get the hell out of here. Captivity and Felix did not get along.

“Yes, for us there are. If he marries her it could potentially pave a road for Claude to re-enter Fodlan,” said Gilbert, clearly annoyed with Felix’s behavior. Felix now understood what they were so afraid of. Claude hadn’t really left Fodlan on the best terms with Dimitri or Rhea. In contrast when she took the Alliance, Edelgard had spared Claude’s life. Members of the old Golden Deer house had defected towards the Empire. It wasn’t all of them, but it was noteworthy that none had come to join the Kingdom. In contrast, the old Blue Lions were down Felix and Mercedes, and according Annette, Ashe had left too. That was news to Felix, but not completely unexpected given Ashe’s family history with the church. If the Kingdom secured Hilda it could be a big help to them.

Holst Goneril didn’t like that the former leader of the Alliance had fled across the border to their greatest rival while simultaneously letting the Empire capture his sister. Holst was spiting both Claude and Edelgard right now and holding the Locket down in cooperation with the Kingdom. The more Felix considered it, the more it did seem like a totally bad trade. Why on earth would the Empire give up their leverage on the Locket? If anything handing Hilda to the Kingdom would settle Holst even more firmly in their corner. This made no sense, but Hubert always had an unnecessarily complicated plan up his sleeves.

Felix got up to pace his cell, he hated not being able to exercise, “I think you’re getting a good deal. She’s worth far more than me.”

“That would depend upon who is assigning the worth,” said Gilbert. “You could go free now if you would just pledge your sword back to your family, back to the kingdom.”

Felix rattled his chains at the old knight, “Not happening.” He had a new family, albeit a super weird one.

Dimitri sighed heavily, “We have been discussing your current _situation_. I have decided that you will be allowed to train for one hour a day, under close supervision of course.”

Felix was a little surprised and caught off guard by the gesture, “Why?”

“Because you like to train, and I can tell how much you have been missing it,” said Dimitri.

Felix got up to grab the bar, “I’m missing other things too you know. Like my partner, do you think you could arrange for me to see her? Or did you think this little act of niceness would make me forget the life I’ve built for myself outside your stupid kingdom?”

Girlfriend no longer seemed like the right term for Lysithea. They weren’t engaged, they certainly weren’t married, but they weren’t kids any more. They were professionally and privately intertwined, and he missed her more than he thought possible. They wouldn’t even let him write her a letter.

“Maybe we’ll hold off on that training offer,” whispered Dimitri as the trio began to walk away.

Felix had really blown that.

***

The news that they were going to stay at Garreg Mach before making their way into the kingdom was met with a tempered response. Randolph and Ladislava had been holding the territory around the border of the Kingdom, including the monastery, for the last five years, but the biggest threat to the abandoned school was only occasional thieves. It was a central point to gather their available forces right near the border of the Kingdom. Members of the strike force had stayed there intermittently over the years, but never for long and never everyone all together. Now it was like a massive reunion before what everyone knew was a quickly approaching end.

The last time Lysithea had seen Randolph fucking Bergliez she’d been getting wasted at one of his parties. Now he was a full general. Oh how time flew by her. He still greeted her in the same way with his bone crushing hug and her feet flailing in the air. This was made partially better by seeing him greet Caspar and Linhardt in the exact same way.

Lysithea supposed a part of her ought to feel nostalgic and happy about returning to Garreg Mach, but she was mostly just tired and annoyed as she opened the door to her old room. It was pretty empty because she had known when to clear out her stuff before the Empire declared war on the Church. Now her trunks of research were stacked around the room waiting to be opened so she could continue her work. That could wait until she felt up to the challenge of unpacking. Lysithea yawned and felt she needed a sugary pick up.

A few doors down Mercedes had opened up her room, abandoned since she fled after her brother and looked around it with displeasure. Lysithea could not help but hang in the doorway. She was fascinated by Mercedes but the dark knight wasn’t much of a talker these days.

“Hey, Mercedes,” started Lysithea. “Any interest in joining me in the kitchens?”

Mercedes looked at her cautiously for a moment, “Why?”

“I need to make something to calm my nerves, I was thinking cookies,”

“You want to bake,” Mercedes paused with clear confusion, “With me?”

“Who else am I going to make sweets with?” demanded Lysithea as she looked around the empty dorm. “Wasn’t that your thing?”

“A lifetime ago maybe,” said Mercedes as she folded her arms.

“Oh come on, at least come and help me reach all the pans so I don’t look like a total fool,” pleaded Lysithea. If she remembered the kitchens correctly they hadn’t been designed with short people in mind. Lysithea had grown a little in the last few years, but most of her height gain was from the platforms she often wore, not actual height.

“No thank you, I don’t wish to get any blood in your cookies,” said Mercedes defensively. Lysithea had been warned by Dorothea that Mercedes was not exactly very popular.

Lysithea stared at her and then started to laugh, “For fuck’s sake Mercedes quit being so dramatic, you sound like Hubert.” She folded her own arms and looked up at Mercedes, “You think you’re the only one who has gotten up to some bad shit in the last five years? You probably have no idea what I’ve been doing, do you?”

Mercedes stayed stony and silent. Lysithea knew that Mercedes had been all over Fodlan killing people like crazy during this war. People were calling her the second coming of the Death Knight, and Lysithea’s personal favorite: Merciless. Yet Mercedes was killing people in battle; it wasn’t like she was going around murdering people off the battlefield. That would be creepy Lord Vestra, and when Lord Vestra killed particularly interesting people he sent them to Lysithea.

At this point she had dissected at least two dozen Dark Mages that Lord Vestra had sent her way. The dark mages were sometimes killed in battle, and sometimes removed by Lord Vestra. He’d ship them in unassuming wood crates to the Aegir territory where Lysithea had set up shop at the old Aegir estate. She had grown rather fond of sleeping in Ferdinand’s gigantic bed, and the Aegir’s massive marble topped kitchen island turned out to be the perfect place to cut up bodies. She’d turned that grand estate into a very dangerous lab.

The work was messy and smelly to be sure, and so unexpectedly wet. While Hubert ensured the bodies got to her as quickly as possible, they were never very fresh. She preferred when he sent her them in winter, and loathed getting a shipment in the middle of summer. Yet she never refused a corpse. She documented tattoos, scars, and any kind of markings she could find. Then she’d start to pull them apart. She started with the skin, cutting the tattoos off in complete hunks and then preserving them by stretching them out and allowing them to desiccate until they could be added to a great big book. She was finding that no two were identical, and as she collected more she was finding patterns and themes. There seemed to be meanings associated with specific shapes and she tasked Hubert with making dossiers about the dead so that she could figure out the connections between them and the markings upon their bodies.

She harvested the dark seals out of the mages. Every once in a while, there'd be a broken one and she had to do the unsavory task of collecting all the pieces and carefully gluing it back together, but largely these were intact. Each seal was slightly different, which was fascinating in its own right. The seals also reacted to being next to each other, as if they were somehow connected or cut from the same material and wanted to become whole again. When she stored them too close to each other they’d start to change more. She had figured out how to store them so that they could be studied in isolation but once as an experiment she had left two broken ones together and watched as over the course of months they slowly merged into one new shape.

Lysithea wanted to know how they were made. She strongly suspected that they all started out looking roughly the same and then changed over time to fit their host. As soon as she had gotten into camp she had gone to Hubert and forced him to let her palpate his new seal. His was still fresh and very circular, but already it had bumps and ridges that didn’t seem to have been there before. Dorothea had seen it coming out of its case; she described it as a flat disk that was a glimmering black, like obsidian.

Yet now it clearly had changed. Lysithea had spent a great deal of time palpating her own dark seal, and knew that it was not a circle any more, but more ovular and spiked. The ones she had collected had taken on various three dimensional shapes during their time in their hosts.

Lysithea stared at Mercedes now, very much wanting to check out her dark seal, but not wishing to risk her life to do so. “Fine, don’t help, but don’t expect me to share when I’m done,” warned Lysithea as she made to walk to the kitchens.

“Fine,” grumbled Mercedes as she came to follow.

***

“I have a visitor for you,” sighed Lord Vestra. Hilda had been brought back to Garreg Mach, but had not been given her old room. Her accommodations at the monastery were an upgrade, but she was still firmly in a cell. At least she had gotten a bath and fresh clothing to wear. 

“I don’t want to see anyone,” said Hilda angrily as she kept her back to him.

“Hilda?” Marianne peeked out from behind Hubert. Hilda turned in shock and her face broke, betraying her utter surprise and relief at seeing her old friend.

“Marianne! Is it really you?” Hilda had sprung up and was at the bars of her cell. “I thought, I thought you died!”

“Me too,” whispered Marianne as she came to the bars and put her hands through so Hilda could hold them.

Hilda was now looking wildly at Hubert, “How? Why?”

Hubert sighed. They had adopted Marianne when conquering Garreg Mach. Instead of fighting or fleeing as most had done, she had gone to the chapel and prayed. She had possibly started praying fervently that one of the big chunks of stone might come loose and crush her when the Immaculate One transformed. However, the goddess had spared her. She waited patiently for the imperial troops to come skewer her, but no one found Marianne particularly threatening. Instead she had just been taken in by her former classmates, fed a hot meal, and given a shoulder to cry on.

Ferdinand had offered to sponsor her as it was decided what to do with her. He always wanted more help with the horses, and Marianne was wonderful with animals. Over the course of the war it became very clear Marianne was no spy, and didn’t have much to return to in the Alliance. She was placed in charge of managing the care of all war animals, and Hubert was pleased to say that the Empires horses, pegasi, and wyverns were some of the best maintained in all of Fodlan. Hubert knew Marianne could be a worthy asset on the battlefield, but he had kept her firmly behind in the camps; she served the Empire far better as a non-combatant than another war torn fighter. She would have never learned to smile on the front lines.

“She stayed behind in Garreg Mach when Claude ordered you all to flee, and we decided to keep her,” said Hubert. He was cautious with Marianne; she wasn’t afraid of him like Bernadetta, but she was still someone to step lightly around.

“You look really well,” smiled Hilda as she dried her eyes.

“I have a place now, a purpose,” said Marianne. “I’m sorry I wasn’t allowed to visit you sooner.”

“But you’re here now, that’s what matters,” said Hilda, not even bothering to stop her tears now.

“I’ll leave you two some privacy,” said Hubert as he quietly excused himself from the reunion. Marianne had already been briefed on what was happening with Hilda; she was to encourage Hilda to cooperate with the empire after her transfer and then she’d be reunited properly with her friend. Hubert hoped this gambit would be enough to capture Hilda’s heart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I feel like there's no way Garreg Mach would be the main base of operations for 5 years, so in this timeline it's a convenient fortification used as needed, but not everyone's permanent home.


	5. Scenes Around Garreg Mach

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Brief glimpses into what's happening as the old students return to Garreg Mach and rest up before they march towards Arianrhod.

_The Tea Gazebo_

Ferdinand looked at the gold cake stand realizing too late that this was probably too much. He checked his pocket watch, there was no time to change anything. Bernadetta was hesitantly approaching the recently refurbished gazebo with wide eyes as she saw all his cleaning and decoration. While much of Garreg Mach was structurally sound, the place was in an utter state of decay after so many years ignored. The tea gazebos especially were not looking very nice, and so Ferdinand had spent his day off renovating one for this very special first formal tea with Bernadetta.

He had completely gone too far with this gesture. When he was coming up with it he fancied it completely romantic, but now he could see he was smothering the poor recluse. Bernadetta shyly let him pull out the chair for her and then Ferdinand sat across from her and poured the perfectly steeped tea. Hopefully the greatness of this blend would offset any of the decor he now felt might be gaudy. She was still studying the little candles he’d set out to help pick up the atmosphere. The flames danced and glittered like stars around them.

“This is really beautiful,” murmured Bernadetta as she accepted her tea cup.

“Thank you, I thought it might improve morale if people could escape somewhere nice to have a spot of tea,” said Ferdinand. He didn’t want to overwhelm her; this had all been for her, but it had slowly morphed into a desire to help everyone take a nice break from the toils of war.

“How long did this take?” she asked as she continued to look at the fresh paint and repaired roof.

“Not too long,” lied Ferdinand. It had taken him his entire day off not to mention some extra afternoons he might have otherwise spent training or attempting to relax a bit. This brief stint at Garreg Mach was intended to be a moment of rest for the Strike Force before they faced their final showdown in the kingdom. No one seemed to be able to sit still though. Ferdinand had set himself to arranging the best tea time possible; Petra was constantly flying around on her wyvern Brutus and practicing dangerous aerial maneuvers, Caspar was pestering Mercedes to wrestle him, and Linhardt was cavorting with Hanneman in the library doing loud experiments that created a lot of smoke.

“I want to thank you for earlier,” said Bernadetta between sips of tea.

“Whatever for?” Ferdinand and Bernadetta had been working on horseback riding. He felt like he had been tirelessly working her to learn how to handle her horse. It had been a grueling day, even on him and he was a master rider.

“You were very patient with me,” said Bernadetta. “I know I’m not, uh, exactly a natural on a horse like you.”

“Oh I wasn’t very good when I started,” Ferdinand assured her.

“I find that hard to believe,” smiled Bernadetta as she retrieved a cookie for herself.

“Oh it’s true, I was actually terrible, but whenever I meet a challenge I commit myself to overcoming it,” said Ferdinand. He realized his chest might be puffing a little and tried not to look so boastful.

“Like when you were trying to get me to leave my room in school,” said Bernadetta.

Ferdinand cringed heartily, “Yes I may have been a little heavy handed.”

“Or weak wristed,” teased Bernadetta. “Ah…I felt bad about that for weeks.”

“It was my fault,” Ferdinand reassured her.

He felt a smile crossing his face, and Bernadetta wrinkled her nose, “Oh no, what are you laughing about now?”

“Not you,” he said quickly. “I’m thinking about what my father will think if he ever hears that I’m courting you.”

“And why is that making you laugh? Is he…is he going to be mad?”

“I don’t think my father has much focus for my love life,” said Ferdinand. “But it is ironic that after I begged not to be betrothed to you, that I would get to know you and become totally smitten with you.”

Bernadetta blushed and sipped her tea. When she set it down she was staring at the table, “To be honest…I was relieved when it fell through.” She took a deep breath, “My father always punished me for the broken arrangements, but I was completely afraid that any man I married would be like him, or worse.” Bernadetta bit her lip and then looked up at Ferdinand, “But you’re nothing like him!”

“Our fathers are quite a pair are they not?” said Ferdinand sadly.

Bernadetta grabbed another cookie and nodded in agreement. Ferdinand studied his tea leaves, “When the war is over, I’d like to run for the position of prime minister. What do you think about that?”

“I think you’ll do a great job,” said Bernadetta enthusiastically. “I’d vote for you.”

That warmed Ferdinand, “Do you think you’d want to go into politics at all?”

Bernadetta froze for a split second and looked like she might flee, but the moment passed and she composed herself, “I don’t know, that sounds like, well it sounds like a lot of meetings and responsibilities. And not very much time for myself.” She scrunched up her face, “Why are you asking?”

“Well, the role of the nobility will surely change when we win this war. While we won’t necessarily have certainty or permanency in our positions, we might actually get more control over our destinies,” mused Ferdinand. “I want to be prime minister because I think I’ll serve the people well, not because I have to do it. I was just wondering what you would want to do if you had the choice.”

Bernadetta thought it over for a few moments, “I think I’d like to be a diplomat and travel around.” She paused and blushed, “Although it would be a lot more fun to travel with you than alone.”

Ferdinand felt his heart swell at the notion of touring around with Bernadetta after the war, “Then let’s make some plans of where we ought to go!” They spent the rest of the too grandly decorated tea plotting out a very ambitious road trip around Fodlan for after the war, whenever that would be.

_The Dining Hall_

Ashe’s brother, Sam, was tugging at his sleeve, “I’m hungry.”

“Alright, let’s get some breakfast,” said Ashe as he showed his brother the way to the dining hall. Ashe hadn’t been sure what was going to happen when he showed up to join the Empire’s forces with his younger brother, but they had found a place for both of them that allowed them to stay together. Ashe was a sniper with the main forces, and his brother had been given odd jobs appropriate for his age.

The food options in the war camps were pretty limited, but there was always enough for everyone, which Ashe couldn’t complain about. He wanted to get on kitchen duty but because he was a combatant most of his time was spent making arrows.

As they ate, Dorothea came over to join them. She had always been welcoming to Ashe and Sam, ever since they first showed up even though they had previously fought on opposite sides. She spent most of her free time making sure the children that hung around the war camps were protected and provided for. These kids were mostly the children of soldiers, or worse the orphans of soldiers. Dorothea made sure they had proper shoes and clothes, new toothbrushes, and safe places to sleep.

At first Ashe had been extremely suspicious of Dorothea’s interest in the children; he had been told the empire was grooming children soldiers to fight in their war. It turned out Dorothea was just charitable because, like Ashe, she too was an orphan who had lived on the streets. Ashe felt bad for believing the church propaganda. He was having to reconsider a lot of things he thought he knew after joining up with the Empire.

Dorothea warmly ruffled Sam’s light hair, “If you want, I’m going to be reading some stories later to the children up in the library.”

Sam looked at Ashe hesitantly and Ashe gave him an encouraging nod, “You can go.” He wanted Sam to spend some time with children his own age, but he understood perfectly why the boy was so reluctant. Lizzy, their sister, wasn’t here. Old classmates knew he had a sister and tried to ask where she was, but Ashe wasn’t interested in talking about it.

As for why he’d fled to the Empire, well, the Church had killed his adoptive family. Over the course of the war, Ashe had gotten some pretty cold feet about serving the people that set up and murdered both Christophe and Lonato. Ashe was trying to do the right thing, trying to do right by his beloved adoptive father, but in this war it was really hard to sort right from wrong. He decided that the best he could do was to protect his remaining family with everything he had, no matter what it forced him to do.

_The Cathedral_

Mercedes preferred to pray alone these days, and she no longer sang. She stared at the Cathedral and debated whether or not to go in. She supposed she could try. She walked up the stairs, but stopped near the gate. Mercedes walked back down the stairs, she wasn’t up for going into the Cathedral today.

_The Bridge_

Mercedes lingered on the bridge, still looking back at the Cathedral. She looked around. There view today was pretty gloomy and no one was really hanging out on the bridge. Mercedes frowned and awkwardly placed one hand over the other. She didn’t want to bring up her hands in open prayer, but this was close enough.

Mercedes cleared her throat. She used to pray to Seiros, but now she believed she ought to get a little more direct, “Sothis,” she started quietly. “Sothis, I have never prayed to you personally before. I don’t know if I’m even supposed to, or allowed to at this point. I don’t know if you can hear someone who has a dark seal inside them, or if that even matters to you."

She took a deep breath and tried to get to the point, "When I stood with Emile against the Agarthans, we lost, and I lost him. I don’t want him back, but, Sothis, please, I’ve asked for much I haven’t gotten, so I’ll make this one last bid. Please give me my revenge,” Mercedes paused as she looked down at the view below the bridge, “And if you won’t, well, then to hell with you.”

_The War Council Chamber_

“You know what this is,” said Lord Arundel as he held up the red orb. It was about as big as his hand and while It was dark crimson in color, a burning light seemed to be buried at its core. Edelgard nodded at the false crest stone, the same kind that powered her great axe Aymr.

“Using this will give you the strength to match the Immaculate One,” promised Arundel as he wrapped up the crest stone carefully in a box.

“You’re seriously suggesting I become I demonic beast,” said Edelgard. She was no longer surprised by anything that came out of Lord Arundel’s mouth. At this point she knew no matter how audacious he could be, he’d always one up himself in some unimaginable way.

Arundel chuckled, “No my Emperor. In the hands of crestless wielder the stone would make a demonic beast, but in your hands, as the bearer of two crests, well you would become something far more powerful than a piddling demonic beast.”

Edelgard stared at him and wondered if she should even attempt to keep the conversation going, “Tell me though, how exactly does one change back?”

“Ah, there in lies the catch,” smiled Arundel. “While I hope it does not come to this, remember, we must have victory at any cost. For Adrestia.”

How convenient that the cost should be her life. “For Adrestia,” she repeated icily back to him. Arundel cared nothing for the Empire or its people.

“I know you have banned their use by your soldiers—” started Arundel.

“I will not reconsider that,” said Edelgard. “If it comes to this, well, then I will be the one to change, not my troops.”

“I suspected you might say that,” said Arundel. His lips drew a thin and disappointed line. “But I have full confidence in you my Flame Emperor.”

Edelgard stood and politely smiled as she took the box, “Thank you for the gift uncle.” No wonder he had explicitly forbade Hubert from attending this meeting, the poor mage would be on the edge of his seat restraining himself from outright murdering Thales right now.

She wasn’t going to involve Hubert in this. It didn’t take much to recognize that he wasn’t doing well and Edelgard was trying all she could to keep extra unpleasantness off his plate. Instead, Edelgard was already cooking up a way to undermine Thales, she just had to bide her time and play nice.

_The Marketplace_

Lysithea was wandering around the market. Her cookies made with Mercedes were long since eaten and now she wanted something more exotic. Merchants tended to follow the war camps with their wares and Garreg Mach was no different. One merchant in particular drew her eye. He was in a shadow behind a wagon near the main stairs up to the front of the monastery and he was wearing a dark mage mask and robes. Subtle.

“Uh, hello?” tried Lysithea as she approached his hiding spot. How exactly did one approach a black market dark mage in the marketplace?

“Ah! Hello young lady, can I interest you in some Morfis plums?” the Dark Merchant opened his cloak up a little and sure enough there were Morfis plums, or really more like Morfis prunes, hanging along the inside.

“That’s not really what I’m looking for today,” said Lysithea as she looked at tiny skulls decorating his belt. She wondered what kind of animal they were from, and concluded it had to be a monkey.

“Right, you strike me as more of the ancient coin type,” tried the Dark Merchant. It sounded like he was smiling behind his mask.

“No,” said Lysithea.

“A book on Monarch studies?”

“Definitely not,”

“Sheet music?”

“Only if it’s for oboe.” Her parents had made the mistake of letting her choose any instrument she wanted to play when she was young, and Lysithea loved the oboe.

“I do enjoy a good minor key oboe funeral march, but I’m afraid all I have is piano,” sighed the Dark Merchant. “How about an Arcane crystal?”

“Warmer,” said Lysithea as she stared up at his long beaked mask, “I’m looking for a dark seal.”

“Hmmmm,” hummed the Dark Merchant as he folded his arms. “I don’t trade in those.”

“Can you tell me who does?” Lysithea probed hopefully.

“You seem like a nice girl—” started the Dark Merchant.

“I’m not,” said Lysithea bluntly. “So do you know where I can get my hands on one or not?”

The merchant looked around and then leaned in close, “All I know is they come from the southeast of Fodlan.”

“Beyond Hrym,” tried Lysithea. She saw his beak nodding. She had research funds she could use for this, “Hypothetically, what do they run for?”

The Dark Mage gave a muffled chuckle, “It doesn’t have a price, not in coin. The price is your life, your soul, committed to the dark path.”

“What if you never volunteered to get one?” asked Lysithea carefully.

“Doesn’t matter, once its in you, you start to change,” whispered the Dark Merchant. “It’s little things, like the love of music played in a minor key, a taste for rich flavors, an affinity towards shadowy jewel tones. Then it’s the bigger picture, a drive to understand the world beyond what faith tells you, the need to control your fate and to doubt the role of the divine. ”

Lysithea pursed her lip, “What if you use it towards good?”

“Dark magic is power and pain, and that is what you hold over others. A dark seal removes the natural hesitancy towards killing, and death is what you become best at dealing,” explained the Dark Merchant. “I have heard dark seal bearers claim to be working towards a common good, but their methods, well, their methods are no good at all.”

“I should be going,” said Lysithea. He had to be wrong; she like cakes and cute things! Sure, she found the melancholy of a well performed orchestral piece in a minor key to be wildly underrated, but that didn’t mean she was walking a dark path. Perhaps she was regularly desecrating the dead these days, but that hardly made her evil, right?

“Oh, okay, well tell your friends about my wares!” shouted the Dark Merchant after her as she walked away.

_The Pond_

The professor wasn’t fishing, she was just staring at the water. Hubert stood beside her on the dock, “May I join you?”

She looked up at him, her pale green eyes seeming a little heavier than usual with their gaze. She nodded. Hubert quietly removed his shoes and rolled up his pant legs before sitting next to her and letting his feet sink into the chilly waters next to hers. It hurt a little bit at first but then he adjusted to the numbness.

“You look tired,” whispered the professor.

Hubert tried to sit a little straighter so she wouldn’t notice just how exhausted he was. “I have bad dreams. It makes it hard to sleep without help.” He was relying on sleep aids to get through the night and coffee to get through the day.

“I have bad dreams too,” said Byleth. “Memories, mostly, of what will be.”

They sat for a while watching the fish come up to the surface and go back down to the depths below.

Hubert stared at the water, “How do you decide when it’s time to go back to the beginning?”

Byleth didn’t respond or react right away. “It depends. At first I lived out lifetimes with the ones I loved, but I don’t really age any more. So when they got old and died, I’d go back trying to find a way to get everyone to survive. Then I started jumping back earlier and earlier. Sometimes before the war even ends.” She squeezed her eyes shut, “Everything has begun to blur. It’s hard to keep track of what happened this time versus others.”

“I dream about dying all the time,” whispered Hubert. Sometimes it was tempting to think he really was dead and that when he was waking he was in hell.

“You do die young more often than you live to old age,” responded Byleth, though not unkindly. “You tend to live less than the others.”

“When I dream, I think I’m seeing those times,” said Hubert, unable to reconcile the intense clarity of these dreams with his normal dreams. They were just getting more intense as the war continued. The were breaking through his sleep potions and playing over and over in his mind.

She studied him carefully, “You started remembering things around my seventh jump. After that, you started leaving contingency plans for what to do when El fails. They’re a big help.”

Hubert stared at the water. He hadn’t told anyone, least of all Byleth, that he’d been gathering information and having it ready for someone to take on his fight after his death if it came too soon.

Hubert thought about his dreams about Petra, but knew that there were other paths he’d taken in other lives. He dreamed about Ferdinand dying on white cobblestones, his orange hair fanned out like the sun around his head. Yet sometimes he also saw Ferdinand naked in his bed shooting him a teasing gaze and calling him a workaholic. He saw Bernadetta surrounded by flames on a battlefield, burnt down until she was unrecognizable. He also saw himself dancing her around at their wedding with both of them covered in delicate embroidered flowers. He saw himself and Shamir killing each other, and killing together. Mostly though he just died alone, sometimes after killing all his friends, as the last defense for his Emperor before she surely died too.

Byleth reached over and took one of Hubert’s bony hands. He swallowed at the contact, he wasn’t sure he had ever really touched the professor. Hubert didn’t want to think about dying and contingency plans. There were other questions he wondered about the professor, “Other than Edelgard, who have you loved in your many lifetimes?”

Byleth was quiet for a few moments, “Dimitri, Claude, Mercie, Sylvain, Petra. Dorothea a few times.” She sighed and he thought she was done but then she continued, “Let’s see I’ve been with Seteth, Manuela, Ferdinand, even Felix.”

“That’s quite a list of conquests,” smirked Hubert. He had a feeling she would continue if he didn’t interrupt. Byleth grinned with her easy confidence that always drove him so crazy.

“And what about me?” Hubert teased. He wasn’t interested in Byleth but perhaps another Hubert had been.

“Never,” said Byleth with a gentle squeeze of his hand. “I can’t let you fall in love with me because I need you to keep a promise.”

“What promise?”

“If the time comes when I change into something,” she paused and swallowed uneasily, “If I become something not human, I need you to put me down, because I don’t think the others could.”

Hubert sighed as he released her hand, “I’ll do what needs to be done.”

“You always do,” said Byleth softly as she pulled her wet feet up from the pond. She looked down at him like someone looking at an old friend, “Let yourself dream again Hubert, they’re just dreams, not fate.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A little Mercedes the Barbarian going on


	6. Four Horse People of the Apocalypse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The gang goes to the Valley of Torment and unfortunately it lives up to its name.

After bringing Marianne to Hilda, the pink haired young woman became much more compliant. Lord Vestra started increasing her privileges one by one. First some laundry and a new set of clothes that were not imperial uniforms or too prudish were gifted to her. Then a hot private bath. Eventually some perfume. Hilda was beginning to look and act like her old self again. She had even, if only slightly, softened towards Hubert. She no longer chided his appearance or vocally wished him dead, which he appreciated since they would be traveling up to Ailell together.

Hubert even took some meals with her, although he could barely eat, to help sell the idea that this was a proper courtship to any spies that might be watching.

“You’re still only eating mashed potatoes?” Hilda actually seemed sad for him. She was enjoying what he would have been eating, a nice steak that had been perfectly cooked up in honor of his birthday as gift to the Strike Force from Edelgard. He was twenty-six today, but he felt like he was seventy-six with all the pain he was constantly in these days.

Hubert looked at his tiny bowl and the boring mashed potatoes, “There’s gravy, it could be worse.” Having his diet restricted to clear broth had been much worse than this.

“What happened to you?”

“Gauntlets,” sighed Hubert. He traced over his clothes where the scar was, “Linhardt stitched me shut; he said they went through my colon, small intestines, and stomach. Thankfully my spleen was spared or I’d likely be dead. Oh, and my dark seal was shattered.” Hubert took a deep breath, “So when that started to poison me, I was opened up on from groin to sternum so they could remove the broken parts, and then a new one was inserted between the layers of muscle.”

“Ugh, I’m trying to eat here Hubie,” whispered Hilda as she looked at him.

“Be thankful you don’t have to marry me, it’s quite a unpleasant sight,” said Hubert dryly. When he was younger Hubert had been embarrassed by his body: gangly limbs, shoulders too broad for a waist too thin, and a face only a mother (of which he had none) could love. These days however, he was older and had come to better terms with what he had. He wasn’t doing a great job of preserving it, but he was grateful to it for surviving. He bargained with his body and promised if he made it through the war he’d attempt to work out regularly, eat right, and treat it better.

Hubert held up his hand so she could see the small tremor that had started in the last year. Linhardt warned it would only get worse with time and continued fighting. He sighed, here was some juicy intel she could take the Kingdom and let them think he was weak. “I have nerve damage all through my insides from the injuries, and my hands are unrepairable from too much casting.”

She studied him for a few moments, “Do you have any regrets sticking by Edelgard for all this time?”

“None,” said Hubert without a pause. He’d love to ask her the same about her loyalty to Claude.

He had finished what he could of the mashed potatoes and set it down as he laid his shaking hands to rest in his lap, “If we don’t win, I’ll be killed in battle or executed for war crimes. So no, I don’t regret giving Emperor Edelgard myself completely, because my life was forfeit the moment we started this war.”

Hilda had finished her meal and gave a passing look at the knife. She could probably throw it at him and maybe even hit him, but instead she returned it to the plate and pushed the tray back through the gap in the bars. She was either biding her time to kill him after she was free, or maybe she no longer wanted him dead at all. Hubert was prepared for the former, but unsure how he felt about the latter.

“Till next we meet my dear fiancee,” said Hubert as he gathered up the empty dishes.

Hilda snorted, “Shall I carry you across the threshold like a blushing bride?”

“Try not to hit me into the doorway, I’m rather long,” said Hubert as he stood.

Hilda winked at him, “Where are we going on our honeymoon Hubie?”

Hubert paused. Where would he go on a honeymoon? Surely not Brigid, he could barely think about that place without starting himself on the road to a panic attack. “Let’s go to Sreng, you can protect me from all the warrior clans.” She laughed as he left and he was almost sad to see her go, but not quite.

***

Dorothea looked at the horse, a nice reddish mare that complimented her dress and hair. She looked at Ferdinand, “He’s not serious about this is he?”

“We both want you to come, but you need to ride a horse,” said Ferdinand as he happily gestured to the beautiful horse.

“What about Bernadetta, couldn’t she go instead?” Dorothea had nothing against horses, she just wasn’t into the idea of riding one, for days, to the literal hellhole that was Ailell.

Ferdinand pursed his lips, “Well, a bow knight is not as effective in this situation. Imagine Bernadetta pinging an arrow off the mountain that is Dedue,” he paused as if seeing the scenario play out, “And then he axes her in two. Yet if you were to use your magic, well, problem solved.”

“Ferdie, it’s unsettling to hear you talking about killing old classmates,” sighed Dorothea. “Stop hanging around Hubie so much.” Ferdinand looked a little ashamed for having been called out but Dorothea understood; certain Faerghians had a weakness to magic. She looked at the horses being prepared for the journey, “Who all is coming on this trip?”

“Myself,” Ferdinand gestured to his great white horse, “Hubert,” the black mare, Ferdinand paused and turned his attention to a frightful looking pale gray horse, “And Mercedes.”

“Oh wonderful,” Dorothea managed at the idea of traveling alongside Mercedes _and_ Hubert for a whole fortnight. “Couldn’t Lysithea go in my place?”

Ferdinand looked rather uncomfortable at the suggestion, “I do not know if she is well enough for this. And besides, would you really leave me in the care of those three?”

The dark mages had gotten rather dark as the war drug on. Dorothea found them to be a depressing bunch even at the best of times, and as the war entered these late phases, the mood that clung to the dark trio was almost unbearable. Lysithea was ill, more than ever, but still full of fight and venom. Hubert had almost died and was presently pretending he was fine even though his every movement looked pained and he could barely eat. Dorothea was concerned a two week road trip might actually finish him off. Mercedes, well, Mercedes was complicated. Dorothea missed the old Mercie terribly, and this short haired, hard stare wearing replacement was a poor imitation of who she had been. Mercedes had gotten a few precious extra years with Emile, but it had come at a cost that Dorothea thought was too high.

“Maybe we should send just those three, they’ll massacre everyone and the war would be done,” suggested Dorothea. She was sure Hubert, especially now that he no longer had Petra to keep him grounded, would gladly blow himself up in order to take down the Kingdom.

“Yes, which is why you and I are going to ensure this is just a peaceful hostage exchange,” said Ferdinand. “Please, I need you to help me keep things sane.” Ferdinand gave her his best puppy dog eyes, “Please Dorothea, plus think of Hilda! She’s already had to put up with Hubert’s attentions for weeks now, I’m sure she could use a friendly face.”

Dorothea sighed as she looked at her horse, “Why do I feel like if I refuse I’ll get a direct order from Edie?”

“Because you will,” whispered Ferdinand sympathetically. “Go talk to Hilda, let her know the good news that you’re coming!”

Dorothea sighed and mentally prepared for the journey ahead as she walked to Hilda’s cell. It was depressing but Hilda actually seemed to be pretty well taken care of. Her clothes had been laundered, she was getting regular hot baths with a privacy screen, and her nails looked fresh every time Dorothea visited. Apparently being fake courted by Hubert came with major perks; Dorothea tucked that information away for future reference.

“I’m coming to help exchange you for Felix,” said Dorothea as she held onto the bars of Hilda’s cell and rested her chin on one.

“Sounds fun to me,” said Hilda sweetly. She tilted her head, “Who else is coming on this road trip of the damned?”

“Hubie and Ferdie,” sighed Dorothea. “And Mercie.”

“Oh goddess,” whispered Hilda as she suppressed a horrified laugh. “Mercedes is still alive?”

“You could call it that,” said Dorothea. Mercedes seemed pretty dead on the inside.

“Who else are you hoarding in this camp, Raph? Ignatz? I feel like everyone is here!”

Dorothea shook her head, “Raphael and Ignatz are still smugglers as far as I know, but they have no allegiance. They don’t have very, uh, warm feelings towards either the Empire or the Kingdom.”

“Huh, well, good for them I guess,” said Hilda as she looked brightly up at Dorothea. “I know Lysithea is here, and Marianne.”

“Leonie is an independent fighter following Byleth around,” said Dorothea. Leonie’s loyalty was purely to the professor, and not at all to the Empire. She wouldn’t even stay in their camp. “And Lorenz is in his territory.”

“I guess that’s all the Golden Deer accounted for, at least the ones in Fodlan,” said Hilda with a touch of glumness to her voice.

Dorothea dropped her voice down, she knew she wasn’t supposed to be talking about this since they still didn’t know who their spy in camp was, “Do you think you’re going to get your brother to open up the Locket?”

Hilda got up and came up to the bars so that she and Dorothea could exchange whispers, “Since the Locket closed, Hubert told me no communication has gone in and out of Almyra. I believe in Claude, but let’s be honest here, I don’t know if he’s waiting on the other side or not.” She glanced around nervously, “Even if I play my part, it still might not work.”

Dorothea felt her expression breaking at that. They needed Claude’s promised support, or they probably weren’t going home. Soldiers were deserting left and right and the Kingdom and Church just seemed so impossibly strong. Hilda put her hands over Dorothea’s, “If he doesn’t come through, you need to run.” She smiled sadly, “And if you ever had any warm feelings towards me, please grab Marianne when you flee.”

Dorothea closed her eyes and exhaled slowly trying not to cry, “Marianne won’t be anywhere near the front.”

“I know, I’m telling you that you shouldn’t be either,” whispered Hilda desperately.

Dorothea sighed, “It’s a little late for me to be running.” She locked eyes with Hilda, “Remember when Claude told you to run, and you didn’t? Well, the Black Eagles are all my Claude.”

***

Ferdinand had all his things packed and the preparations for the trip were complete. Hilda would be on her own horse but in shackles that Hubert was going to enchant so they really couldn’t come off. Ferdinand wished Bernadetta was coming on this trip, but at the same time, there was a big risk in going to Ailell so he was content with her staying safe at Garreg Mach. He blushed as he saw her approaching to see him off.

Bernadetta had a big basket in her arms and Ashe in tow with another. “We decided you needed some snacks,” said Bernadetta. “Ashe was generous enough to help me.”

Ashe nodded as he passed the basket to Dorothea with a smile. “So it’s four of you going with Hilda?” Ferdinand and Dorothea exchanged looks, this was supposed to be a secretive operation. So much for discretion. It felt like half the camp knew at this point.

“Yeah,” sighed Dorothea. “Ferdinand, Hubert, myself, and Mercedes. Should be a hell of trip.”

“Stay safe,” said Ashe as he patted Ferdinand’s horse. Ashe looked a little sad, “I guess send my best if anyone asks about me.”

Ferdinand nodded, “Will do.” Ferdinand cleared his throat and politely pulled Bernadetta to the side. He took her hands in his and looked down at her, “I will miss you terribly but I will be back soon I promise.”

“I know,” smiled Bernadetta. “You’re going to do great!”

He leaned in and kissed her, on the cheek. Bernadetta pursed her lips, “You know, you could kiss me on my lips—”

Ferdinand froze, “Bernadetta, we’ve only just started courting.”

Bernadetta popped up onto her tip toes and kissed Ferdinand on the lips. He was shocked as her little tongue darted into his mouth. Bernadetta pulled back and smiled shyly at him, “I’m learning how to live in the moment, and I just wanted to know what it was like to kiss you like that.”

Ferdinand stared down at her and then moved his hands to draw her into a closer embrace. He kissed her deeply, like he wanted to if there was no noble convention to follow. When they were done Ferdinand and Bernadetta were both blushing fiercely. Ferdinand could not help his foolish grin, “You know, you’re making me not want to go on this trip.”

“No!” Piped up Bernadetta. “I’m making you want to come back faster!”

“Alright,” smiled Ferdinand. “I shall make this the most efficient prisoner exchange ever, I promise.”

Dorothea was peeking around a horse and whistling at them, “Finally! Get it girl!”

Embarrassed, Bernadetta and Ferdinand immediately put about a yard between their bodies. Ferdinand bowed to her, “Farewell Lady Varley, till I return.”

“Bye Ferdinand,” giggled Bernadetta as she watched him quickly walking to his horse. “Be safe!”

Dorothea was cackling as she punched Ferdinand in the arm, “Was that your first tongue kiss?”

“Please stop speculating about what I have and have not done Dorothea,” muttered Ferdinand as he tried to preserve the memory without her spoiling it. Mercedes was approaching with Hilda, whom she physically lifted and put up on the horse that would be lead behind Ferdinand’s. Ferdinand tried to seem chipper, “Good morning Hilda, how are you feeling?”

“I’m grateful for a change of scenery,” sighed Hilda as she looked around, “Although I guess I’m looking at your butt the whole journey so—”

Ferdinand hadn’t really thought about it like that and found himself getting red again. Dorothea winked at Hilda, “Ferdie has the best ass of the Black Eagle boys, trust me. Especially when the only other view is Hubie’s.”

Hilda laughed as Hubert approached looking ill tempered and tired. He had his bag full of his own food and prep materials so that he could make his own gross mash of vegetables. The rest of them would be enjoying the wonderful assorted array of pastries and snacks prepared by Bernadetta and Ashe. Ferdinand found himself really hoping that Hubert was well enough for this journey. Hubert’s uniform was hanging on him looking extremely loose and unbecoming of one of the Imperial army’s top generals. Mercedes pulled him up onto his horse despite him claiming he could do it himself. Ferdinand wasn’t so sure.

As Garreg Mach faded into the background and they rode east to Ailell, Hubert gave them all an extremely boring history lesson on the area. At least one person in the group was excited to see the flaming ruined landscape. Ferdinand sighed, of all the places the Kingdom could have picked, why Ailell? It was convenient because it lay on the border, but it was in quite the opposite direction of where the Imperial army wanted to be heading, Arianrhod. It was also cursed!

“The ground is literally burning, all the time, can you imagine?” Hubert continued rambling on excitedly.

Dorothea and Ferdinand exchanged glances and Dorothea rolled her eyes and started to move her hand imitating Hubert talking, and mouthed _“blah blah, fire, blah”_. Ferdinand chuckled and Hubert glared back at them, “When else will you ever have a chance to see the Valley of Torment? You should be thrilled.”

Ferdinand grimaced, but Hilda interjected from the far back of the party, “Hubie, _honey_ , you’re going to bore me to death before we get there and I’m no good to you dead.”

Hubert grumbled and spurred his horse forward to go ride in silence with Mercedes at the front. Ferdinand sighed, this was going to be a long week. Hilda was having a lot of fun mocking Hubert and calling him increasingly ridiculous pet names. She insisted that everyone refer to them as Hilbert, and was joking about wearing a bejeweled tarantula down the aisle. To his credit, Hubert did not gag her, but he did repeatedly ask her to shut up with a growled “darling” thrown in at the end.

***

Felix was doing push ups in his cell when his father approached. Felix grunted and continued as if Rodrigue wasn’t there.

“Felix, I’ve been told you’re going to be traded for Hilda Goneril,” explained Rodrigue.

“When?”

“Soon, there’s a party going to Ailell to do the exchange,” said Rodrigue reluctantly.

“Are you coming?”

“No,” started his father.

“Good,” said Felix, cutting him off.

Rodrigue sighed and pulled up his chair. Felix ignored him as he focused on counting how many push ups he was up to. “Son, I wish I understood you.”

Felix grimaced and paused his push ups so that he could look up at his father, “You had years to figure me out, but you were always too preoccupied with the fucking boar prince.”

Rodrigue’s nose wrinkled, “Why do you insist on calling him that?”

“Back when I was still trying to get you to pay attention to me, to be proud of me, I squired for Dimitri, putting down that rebellion.”

“I remember, I was proud of you—” started Rodrigue.

“Well I wasn’t proud of myself,” spat Felix. “Cutting down our own people like that, acting like a mad animal, no one should be proud of that.”

“And yet you fight like a butcher for the Empire now,” snapped Rodrigue. “Dimitri was doing his duty. You’re just betraying your country.”

“I have no country,” muttered Felix as he got back to his workout. “I have no King. I have no father.”

His father sighed heavily, “Glenn wouldn’t want this for you.”

“Glenn doesn’t want anything, he’s dead!” growled Felix.

“And what about Sylvain and Ingrid, they’re not dead,” whispered Rodrigue. “Think about them when you’re going back to your precious Empire.” Felix decided he was going to transition to sit ups and willfully turned his back on his father to end this conversation.

To Felix’s surprise, the King himself was coming to Ailell. That seemed excessive, as did the goddess damn gag that Gilbert had suggested be placed on Felix.

“I’m sorry about this man,” said Sylvain reluctantly as he silenced Felix for the trip, “But orders are orders.”

If Felix could scream about the dangers of blindly following orders right now he would have been. Unfortunately all that made it through the gag was a muffled garble of sounds. Sylvain winced, “I’m really sorry. This sucks.” Felix stopped trying to communicate with words and just nodded in resignation.

They put him on a cart with Dedue, who was holding and exceptionally big war hammer in his hands. “Don’t do anything stupid Felix,” warned the retainer.

The hammer was about as tall as Felix, and possibly as heavy. Felix was in no mood to have all his bones broken so he just sat down and did his best to communicate his feelings with his face.

Ingrid came up on her horse, her baby strapped to her chest, “Is this all of us?”

“Wait! I’m coming too,” shouted Annette as she came up on horseback.

“I thought Gilbert said you weren’t allowed,” said Ingrid suspiciously.

Annette frowned and tightened her grip on the reins, “Our source says Mercie is going. So I’m going too, we have a chance to get her back! I’m not wasting that.”

Felix shook his head, there was no way that plan was going to go well, but it wasn’t like anyone was asking him his opinion.

The trip was incredibly boring for Felix. His gag was only removed so that he could eat, and the rest of the time the others were too far ahead for him to eavesdrop on their conversations. Dedue did not speak to Felix other than to communicate warnings or orders. Felix stared at the sky and saw Lysithea in the clouds.

Thankfully they did not descend all the way into the Valley of Torment. Instead they stayed up on the rim of the damned basin. It wasn’t as hot, or as dangerous, but the rim provided a very dramatic backdrop. His gag had been removed but Felix had decided he would just bite his tongue and keep his words to himself as much as possible.

Felix stared at the small Imperial party as they approached, “Something’s wrong,” he murmured.

Dedue tightened his grip around Felix’s arm, “What do you mean, what are they planning?”

“No, not a trap,” said Felix. “Somethings really wrong with Hubert, look at how he’s walking.” Hubert leading Hilda, but it more like Hilda was pulling Hubert along.

“His insides match his outsides,” said Dedue as he relaxed his grip a bit. Felix rolled his eyes. If that was true, well, Dimitri wouldn’t look like a king, he’d look like a boar.

Felix was brought forward and Hilda’s shackles were taken off. Dedue released Felix who walked forward and stopped at Hubert. He looked up at the mage’s skeletal face looking down at him and perhaps it was the madness of his long captivity driving him, but he actually hugged Hubert he was so glad to see him after all this time. The mage, possibly driven mad by his own close call with death, hugged Felix back.

“I’m glad they didn’t kill you, Mire,” whispered Hubert in Felix’s ear.

Felix felt like he could feel ever bone in Hubert’s body, “Same, Death.” They were still using their stupid codes names after all these years. The codes were unfortunately too fitting these days; Felix, like Mire, was constantly getting stuck into bad situations of his own making; Hubert was both dishing out and receiving back his namesake; and Lysithea was becoming, like a Banshee, a sort of ghost.

***

“Please, won’t you stay for a meal?” asked King Dimitri as he gestured to the long table sitting in the field.

“We don’t have time —” started Hubert.

Ferdinand cut him off and elbowed him right in the scar tissue, “Of course we will stay to break bread with you in celebration of this successful negotiation.”

Hubert had to hand it to the Faerghians, they had found something to torture each of their guests, knowingly or not. Ferdinand was seated directly across from Dimitri, with Hubert at his left across from Dedue. Mercedes was to the left of Hubert sitting across from Annette. Ingrid and Sylvain sat across from Felix and Dorothea making up the other end of the table. Hilda sat at the head of the table but was mostly just observing the debacle going down.

Everyone with a pulse at Garreg Mach had to know that Sylvain and Dorothea had engaged in an on-again off-again dating spree through which they had continued sleeping with each other. Sylvain was an immature fool, and Dorothea, also immature in her own way, had thought he would change for her. He never did. Now she sat looking at him and the woman he had committed to, Ingrid, and their fresh little baby boy.

Dorothea was staring at Sylvain, who finally couldn’t take it any more and asked in his easy going way, “Why are you looking at me like that?”

“It’s just, well, you grew up,” said Dorothea softly. “You’re married, you’re a father! I’m just, happy for you I guess.”

“Do you want to hold him?” Ingrid was coming in with the attack baby. Hubert attempted to will Dorothea away from the offer, _No don’t do it! It’s a trap!_ She took the small infant in her arms. Hubert could practically feel her heartbreak radiating off of her. Everyone knew Dorothea loved children and babies. She wanted to be a mother, not now, but when the war was done. She found and took in orphans and made sure they were well cared for. Now she was holding the very thing that she had likely thought once she and Sylvain might someday share. They had successfully broken Dorothea and the bread wasn’t even on the table.

For Mercedes they had seated Annette directly across from her. However, they’d miscalculated, Mercedes was a stone wall instead of person, and poor Annette was the one clearly suffering. Hubert suspected though that beneath Mercedes’ stoic face, she too had to be hurting in silence as well.

After getting nowhere, Annette gently rested her hand on top of Mercedes’ and whispered, “I forgive you, I wish we were still friends.”

Mercedes snapped her hand back, “Your friend died a long time ago, and I do not wish for your forgiveness.” Annette had been dealt a fatal verbal blow.

Hubert was tortured by the food that was served. He stared at the excellent looking crusty hunk of bread on his plate. He could see its delicious crispy ridges and could practically feel them ripping along his scarred over insides. The idea of solid food, while incredibly tempting, was enough to give him an increased heart rate at the thought of the pain it would bring him.

Hubert had not had solid food since Brigid. He was reduced to something like Ingrid and Sylavin’s baby eating overcooked mashed up vegetables and beans. He could only handle a small amount at a time, and so he had gone from eating with everyone to being forced to suck down some mushy excuse for nourishment every couple hours.

“Won’t you have some wine Vestra?” asked Dimitri as he held up the bottle.

“No thank you, I do not drink,” said Hubert. He had gone completely sober after killing his father; his mind was ever clear for this war.

“You can eat, it’s not poisoned,” said Annette with annoyance. She and Dedue had largely prepared this meal, and they were both staring at him now with disappoint and disgust.

“I am sure it is delicious,” said Hubert as he stared at the bread and the meat, overcooked by his standards, with crisp vegetables. All of it would punish him later. Even if he did try to force it, he could only perhaps eat a quarter of the serving before the scars on his stomach would begin to scream from stretching. He was trapped between appearing weak and appearing rude in front a king. Hubert sighed, “I am recovering from a bad injury, and the food I can consume is very limited.”

“Yes, we heard you were killed in Brigid,” remarked Dimitri carefully. “Yet here you are.”

“Sorry to rob you of your celebration,” said Hubert softly as he wished he were anywhere else.

Ferdinand’s punishment was making him regret his polite offer of the meal through political discourse with the King about his Emperor. It was well known that Ferdinand was competitive with Edelgard and did not hesitate to voice his opinions when they were in conflict. Now Dimitri was baiting him to do the same but instead of giving advice, he was trying to trap Ferdinand into publicly disagreeing with Edelgard’s moves.

“I am incredibly curious to know how the Emperor intends to dismantle the nobility, will the Empire merely control every aspect of life?” asked Dimitri.

“We would like to institute a Republic,” began Ferdinand. “Where the people could vote in their representatives, who would then govern their various home regions.”

“And what is to stop the former nobles from merely dominating those roles?”

“It will take time, and education for the masses,” explained Ferdinand. “I expect that the existing nobles will continue to control their home regions for the near future, but they’ll be forced to work to keep that position. To earn it, as a noble should.”

“And crests? Those with crests will always be stronger than those without, how does your Emperor hope to address that inequality?”

“Well,” started Ferdinand weakly.

“How are you addressing it?” cut in Hubert. “You continue to prop up the church and the system of crests even though we know now that the crests were hardly gifts given to the ten elites.”

“If you believe von Riegan,” said Dedue carefully.

“I do actually,” said Hubert, though he hated agreeing with Claude on anything. This wasn’t even a bid to keep Hilda from pledging to the Kingdom, this was a honest admission.

“I support the church because they supported the Kingdom through its darkest time, through the loss of my father and the terrible political upheaval that threatened to destroy Faerghus,” said Dimitri coldly.

“Ah right, they also sanctioned the Kingdom’s genocide in Duscar,” said Hubert as if he was only just remembering about it. “You know, when I was young and first hearing about the Tragedy of Duscar, I thought the tragedy part referred to the massacre of the people, the thousands of people, in Duscar, not just the king and his entourage. How naive I was.”

Dimitri sighed, “I do not expect the Emperor and her dog to understand what it means to love family. She deposed hers to steal the crown, and you are only capable of killing yours.”

Ferdinand stepped in to avert certain diplomatic incident by cutting Hubert off, “Your majesty, I think we are getting into a debate that cannot be easily discussed at present.”

“I was shunned for choosing family,” said Mercedes as she leveled her gaze at her former classmates. “You profess the importance of it, yet none of you understood how I could choose my brother over your friendship.”

“And how has that worked out for you?” Ingrid snapped.

Mercedes got up and left the table. This meal was devolving quickly. Annette looked pained as she made to go after Mercedes. Hubert quickly grabbed her by the arm, which caused Dedue to stand and tower over the mage. Undeterred Hubert looked at Annette, “She hasn’t been who you knew in a long time, you’ll only get hurt.”

Annette pulled free, “Let me decide that.” She followed after Mercedes.

Well, he had tried to warn her. Hubert stared at his inedible plate of food while his stomach loudly growled. He had been looking forward to getting to see Ailell in person, but it seemed the Valley of Torment lived up to its name.

***

The trip back was mercifully dull and uneventful. Dorothea was joking about how she expected to be ambushed the whole trip, but here they were nearly back with no trouble at all. Her joking started to fade as they came up on the view of the monastery.

Smoke was in the distance. Hubert felt his heart sinking. In their absence, someone had decided to launch an attack on Garreg Mach.


	7. Death of a Nabatean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The aftermath of the surprise attack on Garreg Mach

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I wonder if this will hurt to read as much as it hurt to write.

Mercedes stared at the smoke and then turned her horse around to look at the other four, “I can warp myself and two people, or I can send three. I can’t take us all.”

Ferdinand had his lance in hand and an assured look on his face, “I’m going.”

“And then you and me,” ordered Lord Vestra as he looked at Mercedes.

Mercedes looked at him in disbelief, “No. You’re not going. I’ll take Ferdinand and Dorothea and you and Felix will ride back.”

“No,” said Hubert and Felix almost in unison.

Mercedes regarded them and shook her head, “Felix, you’ve been in captivity for months. You’re rusty. Hubert, you,” she just frowned. “You’re not fit to fight.”

Hubert felt like she’d slapped him, “I’m your commanding officer and I’m ordering you to send me.”

“Then court marshal me later,” Mercedes scoffed, “Dorothea, get on Ferdinand’s horse. I can’t warp three animals.”

Dorothea looked at Hubert in confusion and Mercedes barked at her again, “Get on the fucking horse.” Dorothea quickly complied while Mercedes regarded Hubert quietly, “Prove me wrong and warp yourself, and I’ll eat my words.” The three warped away leaving Hubert and Felix in disbelief.

“Rusty!” yelled Felix, “What a bitch—”

“Come on, let’s just ride,” whispered Hubert. He wasn’t strong enough to warp himself to the battle, and Mercedes knew it just by looking at him.

Hours later they were still outside the range of getting comfortably close to the monastery. Hubert didn’t fancy their chances trying to approach in the dark, they were likely to be cut down before being identified. Instead they stopped in a thick glade and decided that having a fire was too great a risk.

“How’s Lysithea,” asked Felix as they shared what was left of Hubert’s food and the snacks still on Dorothea’s horse. “And I mean how is she really, now the other’s aren’t around to hear.”

“She misses you,” said Hubert as he dodged having to describe Lysithea’s deteriorating physical condition.

“That’s not a fucking answer,” hissed Felix.

“She’s angry,” said Hubert. She had always been angry but now it was her main emotion.

Felix sighed. “I wish you had never sent me to the Kingdom.”

“I wish that too,” whispered Hubert.

They heard the snapping of branches and someone running with frantic panting breaths. Felix drew his sword and Hubert stood with a fire spell ready in hand. He could at least look scary to whomever was about to burst into their miserable excuse for a camp.

Flayn looked at them wide eyed as she tripped into the thicket and trembled as she knelt down on her knees waiting to die.

“Get her staff,” ordered Hubert as he stared at the blood soaking her torn up bishops clothes.

Felix yanked the little staff from Flayn’s grip and kept the tip of his sword at her neck.

Flayn sobbed and shook, “Please, just do it fast.”

Felix looked at Hubert for instruction, and the mage held out a hand ‘ _hold_ ’.

“The Church attacked Garreg Mach,” confirmed Hubert. “Based on your present state, I assume the Empire still holds the monastery?”

“Yes,” choked Flayn through her tears. “Please Hubert —”

“It’s Lord Vestra,” he snapped, “And don’t speak unless spoken to.” Flayn let out a teary gasp as she dropped her head to the ground.

Hubert regarded her remembering the little girl that he played go fish with in the infirmary with Jeralt. The excited reporter he’d added to the school newspaper who always did her work on time and with a happy energy. The inexperienced healer he’d rescued from Kronya at the Battle of the Eagle and Lion. Most of all he saw the inhuman creature the Agarthan’s were desperate to experiment on, and Hubert would be damned if he let them anywhere near her.

She looked 14, but she was probably closer to 1400. He wondered vaguely what she might transform into under duress. “Who led the attack?”

“Seteth,” she whispered emptily. Her eyes came up to Hubert’s, “He’s dead.”

Felix and Hubert looked at each other for a moment as they processed the information. Lord Vestra respected Seteth, “Was Rhea at this battle?” Flayn shook her head no. That was a huge relief.

“Why are you running east instead of north?” demanded Lord Vestra.

“There’s nothing left for me in the north,” whispered Flayn softly.

Lord Vestra drew his Brigid knife; Flayn didn’t have to know that he had no intention of truly killing her. He grabbed her by the hair and ignored her pained cry as he crouched by her, “There’s a spy in my camp, I want their name.”

“I don’t know it,” begged Flayn.

She probably didn’t. Lord Vestra let his knife dip into the flesh of her clavicle, _green blood, interesting_. “I want a name Flayn and you can go free.”

Flayn sobbed and shook but she wasn’t very strong, and Lord Vestra was pissed off. He cut her a little deeper, “I wonder if your anatomy is the same as ours. If I keep going well, I’ll get that sweet artery that supplies your arm, and I don’t think you’ll last very long after that.”

“Ashe Ubert! Ashe is our spy,” cried out Flayn.

Lord Vestra put his knife back and released her roughly so she fell down into the dirt. He should have known Ashe was the spy. The Church had picked a good one; someone who could reasonably appear to hate the them, and pick locks like a motherfucker.

Lord Vestra pulled Flayn up on her feet and she cowered from him, “Where do you intend to go?”

“To my uncle,” whispered Flayn, crying harder than ever.

Lord Vestra’s eye twitched, there were more of these dragon creatures beyond Rhea, good to know. Felix looked at him, “What do we do with her?” Hubert said nothing as he drug Flayn along by her little arm and stopped her in front of Dorothea’s abandoned mount. He pulled Dorothea’s things from it and then handed Flayn the reins, “Thank you for the name. Now get far away from here, and don’t stop for anything or anyone.”

Flayn stared at him in disbelief, “Why?”

Hubert recalled what he had told her so many years ago during the Battle of the Eagle and Lion, “There are no rules in war, and who knows when I might need a favor.” His mind was ever looking forward the war that would follow this, and he needed all the allies he could get.

Flayn’s lip quivered as he passed her back her staff. Then her survival instincts kicked in and she pulled herself onto the horse. She was gone before Hubert could reconsider his offer.

Felix was staring at him with a mix of trust and confusion, “What the fuck, why did you just let her go?”

“Because she’s useful to the Agarthans, so I won’t let them have her. If anyone, even the professor, asks, we never saw her,” hissed Hubert. “Come on, we need to move.” They led their horses by foot in the dark, ready to kill off any retreating knights of Seiros that dared cross their paths.

By dawn they were at the gates. Garreg Mach had fallen under siege, and looked like even more of a ruin then when they’d left it. Lord Vestra needed find Ashe before either he or Byleth found out what Hubert knew.

Marianne looked harangued but unharmed as they brought their horses to her at the stables, “Wait, you’re one short.”

“It’s not coming back,” Lord Vestra informed her quietly. Marianne’s face fell but she said nothing. He turned to Felix, “A few things need to happen, we need to find out what is going on, I need to debrief you, and then we need to chat with our friend.”

Lord Vestra found Mercedes first as she helped assess the wounded for triage, “With me,” he commanded.

“I see you didn’t warp here,” she said under her breath as she followed in behind him. They were walking towards the main buildings.

“We’ve got bigger problems, where is Lysithea?”

“Butchering down in the morgue,” said Mercedes with a hint of distaste. It was no secret that she deeply objected to Lysithea’s work.

“Good,” said Lord Vestra. Best to process Seteth before the Agarthans found out. “Who did we lose?”

Mercedes stayed silent. Hubert felt fear rising in his chest. Lord Vestra did not like having to ask twice, “Answer me.”

“Randolph and Ladislava are both dead,” said Mercedes reluctantly. “Edelgard is fine; no casualties for the Strike Force. The professor is physically fine.”

Lord Vestra was silent while inside Hubert screamed.

Lord Vestra remained extremely calm given the situation, “Find me Ashe Ubert, take him to the storage rooms in the morgue, and don’t tell anyone what you’re doing. Bring his brother if the boy is with him.” Mercedes left with her orders and Lord Vestra began running through his options.

Lord Vestra and Felix did not go straight to the morgue. The walked into Garreg Mach and took state of what was happening. It was chaos as healers worked all over the place. Hubert saw Caspar, injured but intact. He saw Fleche beside him, curled up with her forehead pressed against her knees. Hubert sighed, he have to make time to speak with her later. Petra was holding Dorothea who was sobbing. Bernadetta had her eyes closed and was practicing her breathing techniques.

As Hubert got up to the council room he finally saw Edelgard and his soul felt a little more at ease. Beside her Ferdinand was helping her; he had a great big bruise along his face and Linhardt was pestering him to just sit down already so he could heal him.

“Hubert, finally,” said Edelgard as he came in.

“Do you need me for anything immediate? I have a situation to deal with,” said Lord Vestra as he searched with his eyes for the absent professor. She was not here.

Edelgard looked at Ferdinand and back to Hubert, “I think we are managing. The knights of Seiros surprised us. There were many casualties on both sides. We are still trying to finish our count.”

Lord Vestra bowed, “Understood. If you require my presence, I’ll be in the morgue.”

“Hubert wait, you need to know—” started Edelgard with a pained look in her eyes.

“Ladislava and Randolph, yes I have been informed,” said Lord Vestra. He motioned for Felix to follow him to Seteth’s old office.

“It’s been a long time since I’ve been in here,” scoffed Felix as he stared down at the blood stain still in the carpet.

“Yes,” said Hubert distastefully as he took a seat. “I need to know what exactly happened in the Kingdom. I need to know how you were treated so I can adjust my methods accordingly.”

Felix sat and then relaxed into the chair. He look exhausted as he stared at the ceiling, “I was supposed to be leaving, I was all the way in Magdred Way, almost out of the Kingdom. I got lost because it’s so fucking foggy there and then just my luck, Sylvain showed up.”

“Do you think it was luck or do you think they knew you’d be there?”

“What do you mean?”

“Do you really think it’s a coincidence that of all people, your old best friend happened to be in Ubert’s old territory?”

Felix was quiet. “If I was set up, it was good they sent Sylvain because I probably would have killed anyone else.”

Hubert rested his face in his hands as he contemplated what to do about Ashe. If he killed him the professor would be unlikely to take that well. She might even reset the clock as it were. Hubert lifted his eyes up, “Did they torture you?”

“Not physically,” muttered Felix. “They did just about everything they could think of to get me to stay.”

Hubert sighed, “Did they mention any other spies? Did you see others being held as prisoners?”

Felix shook his head, “I was isolated.”

Hubert tapped his fingers on the desk and then got up, “Alright, I’ve kept you long enough, time to go see Lysithea.”

Lysithea was in the middle of draining Seteth’s dark green blood as Hubert and Felix barged in, “For fuck’s sake, are you trying to give me a heart attack?” She looked up and a smile broke across her face, “Fe?”

Felix strode over and hugged her, bloody apron be damned. Hubert gave a passing thought to the fallen school disciplinarian and all the detentions he’d sat through. Seteth had been a good man, moral, strong, and yet willing to stand by and do nothing while Rhea controlled Fodlan and executed those that opposed her. Some people would mourn him, but Hubert wasn’t one of them.

“Were any Agarthans here?” asked Lord Vestra. Lysithea shook her head, and Lord Vestra nodded, “Good, keep on working.”

Hubert walked to the other slabs and the shelves of the dead already transported to the morgue. It was very full in here. Hubert walked through the rows of shelves taking note of who he recognized. He paused at Shamir. “Should have killed me when you had the chance,” he whispered as he felt her cold hand.

Randolph and Ladislava were next to each other on a marble slab.

Randolph and Ladislava were dead. Hubert took a deep breath as he allowed that knowledge to seep through him. Hubert had quietly and madly fallen in love with Ladislava from a distance in the way that painfully weird fifteen years do. As he’d gotten older he’d traded his juvenile crush for a very nice friendship with a wonderful loyal general who supported Edelgard as firmly as he did.

Hubert was sixteen when he met Randolph von Bergliez, who might have been the only person other than Edelgard to meet Hubert and immediately like him. Randolph hadn’t looked at Hubert and written him off as a pathetic creepy loser, he had seen him for what he was: very awkward and extremely self conscious. Randolph had lifted Hubert up both literally and figuratively. He’d taught him to be slightly less strange and quite a bit more confident. Randolph had been his rival, his comrade, his friend. Hubert couldn’t even be angry when two of his favorite people only had eyes for each other instead of him. He had been so happy for them, and they were now dead, because of the spy that had been welcomed into their ranks. Hubert quietly composed himself and then slipped the pairs’ hands together so they appeared to be holding each other.

Lord Vestra pulled Felix from his happy reunion and the pair set to the unpleasant task of talking to Ashe. Mercedes had restrained both Ashe and his younger brother, and had them waiting in the nearest storage room.

Lord Vestra stared at Ashe, “You were given up.” He looked at Mercedes, “Take him into the morgue and wait for me, leave the boy.”

“Wait what,” started Ashe frantically as Mercedes drug him out of the room leaving his younger brother behind.

Sam Ubert looked like a littler Ashe and his eyes were watery. Hubert crouched down to get level with him, “How old are you?”

“Ten,” said Sam as he wiped his nose on his sleeve.

Ten years old had been a very tough age for Hubert; Edelgard had been taken away, and his father decided he was old enough to learn how to kill, all in all, ten was maybe his worst year ever. He sighed and gestured for Felix to come over. “This is Felix. In about ten minutes he’s going to start pretending to hit you, and when he does that, you need to scream.”

“No,” said Sam defiantly. Lord Vestra admired his courage and pitied his stupidity.

Lord Vestra sucked in a slow breath, “Well, if you don’t comply, or worse, you do a bad job, he has my permission to actually beat the ever loving shit out of you, so, your call.”

The boy looked about to vomit. Good.

Lord Vestra gave a passing look to Felix, who seemed to understand his orders perfectly. Lord Vestra stood and left the storage room for the morgue. Lord Vestra produced a chair and some rope and soon Ashe was ready for interrogation. Lysithea glanced up to assess the situation and then wordlessly returned to her dissection. Ashe had been very quiet this whole time. He was very pale and breathed slowly.

“The professor vouched for you,” said Lord Vestra slowly as he looked at Ashe. “Did she know what you were up to?”

“Please, no, she didn’t know,” begged Ashe. “Only I knew.”

Lord Vestra nodded, well this was a pathetic attempt at staying silent. “Did they give you any training on how to be interrogated?”

Ashe looked up at him and gaped before firmly shutting his mouth. Lord Vestra sighed, “Is this loyalty to the church or did they have something to motivate you?” Ashe continued his silence. Lord Vestra hoped up to sit on the slab beside Seteth’s corpse. “Do you know what the church does when they catch my spies?”

“They hang them,” whispered Ashe.

“Oh they do a little bit more than that,” said Lord Vestra as he looked admiringly at Seteth and then back to Ashe. “They kill them, yes, and then they cut off their heads and mail them to me. Did you know that? Yes nothing more pleasant than getting a box about this big,” Hubert held up his hands to demonstrate, “Dripping with blood, with my name carved in the top.” Hubert smirked, “They’ve sent me a lot of heads, and unfortunately I don’t even recognize them all. I can only imagine what’s running through those poor saps minds as they’re being accused of working for me.” He swung his legs cheerfully, “I imagine it’s a good excuse to get rid of people. The church is excellent at that. Ask Lonato about his son Christophe, oh, wait, I can’t because they got rid of him too.”

Ashe’s mouth was set into a firm line as he stared at a corner. Lord Vestra hopped down to walk over and stand in front of Ashe, “I can’t imagine you’re doing this out of faith. What do they have?”

“They have my sister, to guarantee my compliance,” said Ashe softly.

Ah, there it was, the missing sister. Lord Vestra had guessed as much as soon as Flayn betrayed Ashe. As if on cue, Sam started screaming. Lord Vestra made a mental note to offer Felix a raise, his timing was simply sublime.

“Leave my brother out of this! He’s innocent, he’s a kid,” yelled Ashe as he struggled against his bindings.

“He’s ten,” shrugged Lord Vestra. “That’s how old I was when I made my first kill. Hardly a child, in fact, he’s old enough to be a soldier.” Even Mercedes flinched slightly at that, perhaps recalling Emile at ten.

“You’re a monster,” hissed Ashe.

“Indeed,” sighed Lord Vestra. He let the screams continue for minutes without speaking. He could hear Lysithea growing annoyed at the sound and gave a nod to Mercedes, “Please go tell Felix that is sufficient.”

Mercedes rolled her eyes behind Ashe. She hated when he made her run errands like this.

“Are you going to kill me?” asked Ashe quietly when Sam’s screaming had ceased.

“No, I need you to run a message,” said Lord Vestra. Ashe stared at him uncertainly. “I will be sending you back to the kingdom. Please inform the church that we are dismembering Seteth to learn his secrets. Tell them Flayn is gone.”

Ashe looked very sad at that, “The professor, the professor spared her.”

“Yes, but she ran into me on her escape,” said Lord Vestra as he drew his Brigid knife, still green with Flayn’s blood. He let his mouth stretch into a very wide smile. “We’re going to keep your brother. Here’s my advice; go back to the church, deliver my message, put your spy skills to use getting your sister back, and get the hell out of there.”

Ashe looked thoroughly beaten and Lord Vestra hadn’t even touched him yet. “I don’t often kill spies, because it’s more efficient to send them back with messages. But I also don’t leave them unscathed because I’d hate them to sneak back in.” He turned and looked at Seteth searching for something that would work. Ah, a nice uniform button emblazoned with the crest of Seiros. Hubert ripped it free and used a fire spell to heat it up. He continued to smile as he branded the symbol of Seiros into Ashe’s beautiful freckled cheek.

Ashe struggled and cursed and so Lord Vestra cast the button aside and grabbed Ashe by the chin. He regarded his Brigid knife and then used it to spell out S-P-Y into Ashe’s other cheek, still thick with baby fat. It was high enough that no beard could cover it and low enough that Ashe would be forced to wear his hair like Hubert if he ever hoped to obscure it.

“If you come back with your sister, I’ll turn your brother over to you and let the three of you leave,” promised Lord Vestra. “But I swear, if I see you on the battlefield against us, you better hope you’re good at dodging.”

Ashe was quietly sobbing and bleeding as Lord Vestra released him and kicked him the hell out of Garreg Mach.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had to add another chapter just to decompress after this! Imagine going straight to Arianrhod...where I'm sure things will be just fine :D
> 
> RIP Seteth and Shamir, two of my favorites, just not in this plot.


	8. Continuing Scenes from Garreg Mach

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the wake of the attack: Lysithea takes tea with a new friend, battle plans get drafted, an unplanned proposal is made, and the professor is comforted over her losses.

_The Marketplace_

Lysithea had watched quietly as Hubert branded Ashe. She was glad Felix was not in the room because she knew he would be horrified. However she felt nothing, nothing other than annoyance at the distracting noise. Now Hubert was gone with the spy and Lysithea was alone again in blissful silence. Lysithea would have just ended Ashe; she understood Hubert was afraid of doing things that might trigger the professor’s alleged time powers, but as far as Lysithea was concerned, jumping back wasn’t the problem. It was going forward that had her worried.

Something deep inside her knew she had a deeply flawed response to the situation. However, her burning dark seal suggested otherwise. She loved Felix, loved him as much as she could, but knew that he would never understand her apathy towards suffering. Her trials hadn’t made her empathetic or unwilling to harm others, if anything they had made her harder in her resolve to deal back as much pain as possible. Maybe it was the stupid dark seal or the double crest, or maybe it was just how she was underneath it all.

She looked down at Seteth’s bloodless corpse and sighed. She supposed she ought to say sorry or something, but she didn’t feel any remorse at all as she contemplated dismembering him. His secrets would soon be hers. Maybe he would even bless her with a chance at surviving this shitty hand life had dealt her.

Lysithea took a deep breath, she needed a break and some fresh air before she did this. Maybe that would help her feel something again. She cleaned up herself and went out into the hall. It was silent; Felix and Mercedes were surely off helping Hubert clean up the Ashe situation. What a mess that was. She’d try to find Felix later, maybe they could catch up over a meal.

Lysithea got out into the cemetery and decided that there was one other person she wanted to check in on post-battle to see how they faired. The entrance to Garreg Mach was a wreck. The blacksmith was trying to pick up all her billets, ingots and scattered tools. Someone had been impaled on her anvil that hadn’t been cleaned up yet, and she was cursing as she talked with the weapons salesperson next to her. His stall had been raided completely and now he was ruined unless the Emperor helped recoup some of his losses.

The south Fodlan and east Fodlan merchants had put aside their rivalry and bickering for the time being and were just hugging it out as they said how happy they were the other was alive. Anna was bitching to whoever would listen that someone had gotten blood all over her tunic.

“Dark Merchant, are you okay?” Lysithea saw a man in dark mage clothes but no mask. He looked incredibly average, like someone who if he wasn’t wearing his dark mage mask wouldn’t be noticed at all.

“Oh, hi,” said the Dark Merchant. He seemed less jovial and quite a bit more tired than usual. “Uh I’m not open today, I need to figure out what I even have left.”

“I understand, I just wanted to make sure you were alright,” said Lysithea. She had been coming by to purchase tea and chat with him every couple days since getting back to Garreg Mach.

“Really?” the Dark Merchant looked surprised. He paused and looked her over, “Are you okay?”

Lysithea shrugged, “No worse than usual.” She lingered uncertainly, “Well, I guess that’s what I came here to do so—”

“You want some tea? On the house I mean, I’m making some anyway,” offered the Dark Merchant as he gestured to the kind of destroyed table and chairs around the super closed Ale Wagon.

“Yeah, actually,” said Lysithea as she took a seat. Soon she was enjoying a choice cup of Hservelg Blend. “I’m Lysithea by the way.”

“Derrik,” said the Dark Merchant as he raised his tea cup to her. “Hey kid—”

“I’m not a kid,” bristled Lysithea, “I’m 21!”

“That’s a kid,” said Derrik slowly. “Anyway, I wanted to ask, do you have a dark seal? I couldn’t help but see you in battle yesterday.”

“Oh, yeah, I do,” said Lysithea sheepishly.

Derrik shook his head in disbelief, “Who the heck let you get one so young? I was 27 when I got mine, and even then all the guys in my order were calling me a baby.”

“I didn’t ask for it, I was a,” she paused, “I was two years old.”

“Fuck,” whispered Derrik before taking a long sip of tea. “Let me guess, those Shambhala fuckers did it.”

“My friends and I call them Slithers,” said Lysithea darkly.

Derrik looked especially pissed off as he sipped at his tea, “They give other orders a bad name. I’m in the Leicester Alliance Dark Engineers by the way, and we don’t even let people younger than 25 come to our meetings. You have to have a chance to become yourself before you choose the dark path. That’s what it means to be a _real_ dark mage, you choose your own path and you let others do the same for themselves.”

Lysithea had been wondering for a long time what she would be like without the dark seal or the extra crest inside her, “Do you think your dark seal changed you?”

“It certainly did,” said Derrik as he flexed and extended his fingers. “The rush of power at first was intense. Certain emotions just heightened completely beyond what I thought possible. I was married when I got it and I felt more in love with my wife than ever before.”

“Where’s she?” asked Lysithea as she imagined Mrs. Dark Merchant and Derrik’s kids all dressed in black.

“Oh we got divorced. I chose the dark path, but she didn’t,” said Derrik softly. He looked into his teacup, “There were other emotions that dampened or slipped away, and I don’t think she liked that change very much.” He gestured to the blacksmith’s anvil where some soldiers were finally collecting the dead combatant who’d been impaled, “Like the first time I killed someone, I was scared shitless, but not because I’d done it, the killing part was easy, I was scared because I didn’t feel anything at all when I knew that I should.”

Lysithea was pained by just how much she could relate. Derrik collected her empty tea cup and gave her a weak smile, “Hey, thanks for checking in on me. I haven’t really made very many friends at the market place.”

Lysithea smiled, “Maybe we can have tea again sometime. But, in the meantime, you should totally chat with the front gate guard, he’ll be anyone’s friend.” She spied her friends coming back from kicking Ashe out of the place, and decided to go see what they were up to, “Alright, bye Derrik, till next time!”

_The War Council Chamber_

Edelgard didn’t like to sit at meetings. If she did then she was stuck in a chair for hours. Therefore she often stood and paced as her council spoke. Thales was sitting in his seat at the head of the table, wearing the skin of her late uncle. She regretted that these days she barely remembered the real Lord Volkhard von Arundel, the one who had desperately tried to rescue his sister and niece from the Insurrection by taking them to Faerghus. He had died there, eleven years ago, and Thales had brought her back.

Mercedes was standing at attention by the entrance to the council room, ready to remove anyone that needed it. Edelgard appreciated Mercedes loyalty and service, but she was concerned for her mental well being. Edelgard knew all too well what it was like to bottle up pain and hide oneself away. Edelgard had a plan to give her trusted guard something to focus on that was more in line with what used to make Mercedes happy, long before following Jertiza and getting a dark seal.

Hubert entered with Lysithea and the two were deep in conversation. Edelgard pitied whoever was on the receiving end of their schemes. No one dared to question the white haired girl’s presence; if you came in with Lord Vestra then you belonged. Hubert had taken the empty seat next to Count Bergliez. “I’m sorry about Randolph,” whispered Hubert.

The venerable war master cleared his throat, “He might not have been born a Bergliez, but he sure as hell died as one.” The Count was looking at Hubert like he was a ghost of someone he used to know.

Hubert might as well have been a ghost with the way he seemed to be fading away right before her eyes. Edelgard knew that the only way he was sleeping at night was by taking increasing doses of sleeping draughts. He was building an addiction and a high tolerance to them, but he clearly did not care about the long term consequences of this. Longevity to him was now a moot point, and Edelgard was deeply troubled that Hubert seemed to no longer have any intentions to survive beyond eliminating the Agarthans.

Lysithea hardly looked better. Her eyes were rimmed with darkness and her cheeks were beginning to hollow out as she grew up. Her skin was almost as pale as her hair at this point, and were it not for the bright purples of her clothes, she might not seem to have any color about her at all. She had made it almost nineteen years past the experiments conducted on her, but with each passing month it seemed unlikely she would make it many more.

Edelgard also didn’t have time to keep dragging this war on. She had a government to reform, and a continent to recast. Time was an ever present enemy hovering over her. Byleth assured her things would end soon, although Edelgard could not understand the professor’s confidence in this. When the war was done, Blyeth promised they would work to fix Edelgard. Hanneman and Linhardt were keen to save Lysithea, but all Edelgard saw was more cutting and experiments. Lysithea was desperate for anything that might work, but the two women confided in each other that there didn’t seem to be a bright road ahead. No one else understood what it was like, and as Edelgard watched the cures fail and Lysithea weaken, she knew the same was coming for her at a steady march with each passing second.

Byleth was safely away from this meeting; Edelgard didn’t like to mix her in with the Agarthans. It was better if she just appeared as a skilled warrior and not a critical council. While Edelgard was sure no one, not even her, could take down Byleth at this point, the Agarthans had killed off Jeralt as if he were nothing. Edelgard didn’t want to take any chances.

“We must take Arianrhod if we are to have any hope of taking the Kingdom,” said Count Bergliez.

“Arianrhod is controlled by Cornelia, one ours,” said Thales. “Clear out the Kingdom riff raft, but do not touch her.”

“Understood,” said Edelgard. It would certainly be a shame if the Agarthan operative responsible for carrying out the Tradgedy at Duscar were to get hit by friendly fire mused Edelgard as she looked out at her room of loyal council.

They plotted out the logistics of the coming battle and the meeting drug on. They needed time to recover but that would also give the church and Kingdom time; they would start their march as soon as possible. This was to be the final push: clear Arianrhod, march to through the Tailtean Plains, captured Fhirdiad. From there they would have the leverage to take on Rhea and force a surrender from the church.

When everything was done Edelgard motioned for Hubert and Mercedes to follow her. Lysithea made to join them, but Edelgard smiled and stopped her, “Lysithea, you’re dismissed, you should go spend some time with Felix.”

“Is that an order?” smirked Lysithea, although it was clear she was happy to get away.

When she was gone, Edelgard led Mercedes and Hubert to the privacy of the Archbishop’s old council room. “These coming battles will be decisive in determining our victory. I need everyone at their best.” She stared at them both with a hard glare, “Neither of you is well.”

She watched the two them get defensive, and cut them off before they could protest, “Hubert, you have been my most loyal friend for 20 years. You have loved me more than any other, you have always worked to protect me, and you tirelessly ensure that my needs are met.” She stared at him and found her heart breaking at his haggard appearance. He looked like he was dying, “And yet, you think so little of yourself that you are disappearing before my eyes.”

She turned her gaze to Mercedes, “Mercedes, we were not friends in school. Yet you have come to serve me as my most trusted guard in the last two years. I know that you will not let anything bad happen to me.” She paused and looked at the two of them together, “It will be incredibly bad for me if something happens to Hubert. Therefore, Mercedes, I am entrusting his care to you.”

Mercedes looked at Hubert like she would like nothing more than to shove him off a cliff. She composed herself, “What does that entail?”

“Make him eat more, make him sleep without potions, keep him in line when he attempts to do too much,” said Edelgard. “Heal him.”

“You’re giving me a babysitter?” growled Hubert, clearly wounded by the choice.

Edelgard frowned to communicate how serious this was, “Mercedes, you have always been at your best when helping others. Hubert, you learned how to care for me, and frankly never learned how to care for yourself. You have spent too much time watching over everyone else, now you need someone to watch over you.” She folded her arms as if welcoming them to challenge their emperor, “These are my orders. Either obey them out or do not come to Arianrhod.”

_The Tea Gazebo_

Ferdinand didn’t curse, but he wanted to! His gazebo remodel had been lost to the battle. Fudge...that did not seem like enough to express his anguish. Ferdinand allowed himself a breathy little “ _Fuck_.” Just muttered, barely audible.

“Oh no,” whispered Bernadetta behind him as she looked upon the ruin that had been their special tea taking place mere weeks before.

FUCK! Had she heard him utter such a word? Ferdinand wondered if he could just disappear on the spot right now, he wondered if Hubert might know such a spell. No, Hubert would only know spells to kill him on the spot, not hide him from his embarrassment.

“It appears to be yet another casualty of this war,” said Ferdinand trying to sound upbeat. He was not feeling great though. Mercedes had warped them right into the thick of things. She had pulled out her scythe and gotten to work while Dorothea and Ferdinand had scrambled to adjust to the chaos. Mercedes was, well, she wasn’t the Mercie he remembered from choir practice. Ferdinand had then filled in for Hubert in assisting Edelgard immediately following the terrible attack. All in all, he was exhausted but not too tired to talk to Bernadetta. He was never too tired for that.

“Ferdinand, do you want to, do you want to talk about the battle?” Bernadetta sounded timid.

Yes, he wanted to talk, but no, he didn’t want to seem afraid. He needed to be strong for her. If he admitted he was scared of the war, well, who would she lean on? “I’m fine, just disappointed that my, _our_ , gazebo is in such a state.”

“It was very nice,” started Bernadetta, “And I know you worked really hard on it, but—”

“But?”

“But it doesn’t matter where we take tea, as long as we’re together,” said Bernadetta as she grabbed his hand and gave it a comforting squeeze. “We could go sit on that ledge over there.” She nodded towards the short wall surrounded by hedges. It looked quite uncomfortable and cold. Ferdinand looked down at Bernadetta, who gave him back an eager happy stare, and he decided he didn’t care about the optics of tea time, he was much more focused on the companion with whom he would share whatever beverage was available.

“I heard you were something of my rescuer,” said Ferdinand as he sipped tea out of a chipped tea cup. It was the saddest tea time he’d ever seen, but one the happiest he’d ever partaken in.

Bernadetta blushed, “Uh, it wasn’t just you! I had to save Dorothea too!”

Ferdinand had been passed out at the point that Bernadetta had apparently used all the horse skills he’d taught her, and cut her own path alone across the battlefield. He wished he could have seen it, although Dorothea had given him a properly dramatic account of the whole thing. “You know, I think your parents made the right choice in naming you Bernadetta, _brave bear_.”

“I never thought I was worthy of it,” said Bernadetta softly as she held her handle-less tea cup.

Ferdinand set his cup down and then cupped his hands around Bernadetta’s, “You are the most worthy of it. You are Bernadetta von Varley and you should declare it for everyone to hear on the battlefield!”

Bernadetta grew crimson at the thought, “That’s kind of your thing. I would sound like Bernadetta von Aegir if I started doing something like that.” Ferdinand thought she made quite an excellent point.

“Well, maybe you should be Bernadetta von Aegir,” said Ferdinand wishing he had a token or something to give her. All that surrounded him was his destroyed gazebo. He told her to sit tight for a moment as he walked over to it and fetched a sad strand of gold tinsel from one of his too many decorations. He came back, dropped to one knee, and tied it around her ring finger, “There, that is a place holder for when I get you a proper engagement ring.”

Bernadetta stared at it, getting redder by the second and then looked up at him, “This is serious, you’re not messing with me right?”

“If you’ll have me, then yes, it is very serious,” said Ferdinand wishing he had some gambit support right about now.

Bernadette squeaked as she tossed her tea cup to the side and tackled him with a forceful kiss-hug combo. When she let him up for air he smiled and brushed her hair out of her face, “You know that _was_ one of our last intact tea cups.”

“Oh no! Uh, well we’ll just have to share everything from now on,” said Bernadetta with a bubbly confidence as she leaned down and kissed him again.

_The Cathedral_

Byleth laid along a pew and stared up at the great big hole in the ceiling left by the Immaculate One five years ago. She hadn’t really ever cried before her father died, and she was hard pressed to admit to a time following that where she had been moved to tears. However, today was different. Byleth didn’t know how to stop crying.

Seteth was dead and it was her fault. She had fought her way to Flayn first, because she knew right where she was going to pop up, and had convinced her that she had to flee. Byleth had gotten there just in time to spare Flayn. She pleaded with her to seek out her uncle Indech, who would protect her and keep her safe. She explained where to find him and begged her not to return to Rhea.

Seteth was too far away to get to in time. He was on his wyvern, raining down hell on anyone that dared to engage him. Byleth assumed he would be fine for the time she needed to cross to him and talk him down, and convince him to leave too. Neither she nor Seteth could have anticipated Mercedes warping in with Ferdinand and Dorothea just behind Seteth and his battalions.

Mercedes and her stupid scythe were new this time. Byleth had never seen this version of Mercie in her many jumps and frankly she did not like the dark knight version of someone who usual a stalwart beacon of light. This Mercedes was angry, unpredictable and reluctant to talk to Byleth, making it hard to understand what she was going to do. She cut down the calvary nearest Seteth with an amazing indifference.

Then Ferdinand, brave, heroic, idiotic Ferdinand had taken on Seteth himself. Seteth knocked Ferdinand from his horse, launching the cavalier to the ground and unconscious. Dorothea had sprinted to him to heal him as Seteth swooped down. He was going to kill them both, but he never got the chance. Bernadetta having seen Ferdinand in trouble had bravely rode her horse through the dangerous battle just to get in range to shoot down Seteth.

It was the fall that killed him. And Byleth had tried to rewind the clock to stop it. Somewhere very deep inside her she swore she heard Sothis’ voice once more, whispering, “No.” The divine pulse never went off and the battle continued as Byleth realized in horror this could be permanent. There might not be any going back. This was an unpleasant first.

Ashe had shot down Shamir. Byleth couldn’t stop that either. She didn’t even have to ask to know that this was his revenge on Catherine for what had happened to the Gaspard family. Byleth quivered in the pew as she processed it. Shamir usually stuck with Byleth through the war, but whenever she got too close to Catherine she would stick with her instead. They were a prickly pair but they seemed to really love each other. Time after time, they would more often than not end up with each other and Byleth had come to see them as some sort of soul mates. How else could she explain the way they managed to find each other again and again through the changing streams of time?

“Professor,” whispered Edelgard as she approached. Another voice that echoed to Byleth in the streams of time. The woman she loved who died in so many horrible ways in so many horrible timelines.

Edelgard came and sat on the pew and coaxed Byleth’s head into her lap. She gently stroked her fingers through Byleth’s hair and helped to dry her eyes with a soft handkerchief. Edelgard did not question her grief over enemies that had once been friends. Byleth had all but demanded Edelgard not stop her from trying to spare Seteth and Flayn, and the Emperor had turned around and encouraged her to do it. When Byleth’s tears had finally slowed and ceased, only then did Edelgard speak.

“We will be marching to Arianrhod soon, within the month,” said Edelgard softly. “Any special advice for me?” Byleth refused to tell her explicitly about the time jumping, but, she could at least give her snips of sage wisdom earned from too many lifetimes on repeat.

Byleth closed her eyes and envisioned Arianrhod. Something bad always happened there, but it was hard to remember specifics especially in chaotic battles. Byleth swallowed, “Stay close to Arundel, especially after the battle.”

“Noted,” whispered Edelgard as she gave Byleth’s hand a comforting squeeze.

_Hubert’s Old Dorm Room_

Hubert was pacing and ranting about how Edelgard was being unreasonable. Mercedes closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She waited for him to get in position and then lifted her hands and cast a strong sleep spell. He bounced backward onto the bed completely passed out.

It used to be her favorite way to peacefully disarm enemies. She hadn’t used it in a long time, but this felt appropriate. Mercedes knelt down to pick up Hubert’s big feet and shifted them onto the bed. She lifted his head just high enough to get a pillow under it. Mercedes smirked and flipped him off, “Good night Hubert.”

In the morning she’d figure out what the big baby was supposed to eat.


	9. Arianrhod

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Imperial troops push towards Arianrhod, where Felix must confront both Rodrigue and Ingrid.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the proper song for this battle https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsOHvP1XnRg

After two days of trying to care for Hubert, Mercedes had marched into Edelgard’s office and demanded a raise. She was granted it without question because even though the Emperor loved him, Edelgard was completely aware that Hubert was a massive pain in the ass. Mercedes needed to check on the progress of Hubert’s healing, which required her to force him to strip. It was awkward and uncomfortable for them both, which Mercedes expected. What she didn’t expect was just how much he reminded her of Jeritza. 

Her brother’s body had been repeatedly damaged and repaired and by the time he was dying he was a mess of scars and pain. Hubert was similar but instead of being a hulking knight, he was a rail thin and grotesquely so.  His hygiene was thankfully meticulous because Mercedes didn’t think she could handle that on top of everything else. 

She had quickly identified why he looked like a skin covered skeleton; his diet was mostly mashed potatoes and not nice ones. He would literally boil a potato and mix it with water — not even milk because she found out the hard way that he wasn’t lying about being lactose intolerant — and eat that. He might add lentils or beans if he was feeling adventurous. This was what he had been eating for the last two months. Mercedes tried it herself and realized it was fucking terrible which was likely why he was barely eating.

Mercedes quietly ignored Hubert’s requests to stop putting so much butter into the more balanced meals she was preparing. She was also convinced that he could probably eat solid food he was just terrified to do so, but she was working with him in baby steps. His cheeks were no longer as harshly concave and Mercedes pinched them to get her point across, “You look better.” 

“I look fat,” he complained as he pushed her away. 

It was ludicrous but Mercedes used his insecurities against him, “Well if you think you’re too plump you could try working out.” 

“You hate exercise,” hissed Hubert. 

It was true, she did, but she hadn’t been especially soft in a long time and didn’t need any extra exercise. “Oh I’m not training with you, Ferdinand and Felix will.” 

Thus started Hubert’s training circuit from hell. Between Ferdie and Fe, someone was always available to chase Hubert around the training grounds and throw stuff at him. This in turn made him hungrier, so Mercedes plied him with more buttery food that had substantial proteins and carbohydrates. He actually filled out his uniform again and no longer looked at risk of blowing away in a strong gust of wind. 

Lysithea would come whenever he was training with Felix and taunt Hubert. “Come on noodle arms, bench press me!” The first time he tried, Mercedes and Felix had done a bad job of spotting and ended up letting poor Lysithea just totally fall on top of Hubert’s face. Ferdinand had not been eager to try out the same exercise with Bernadetta and instead focused on a very serious lance training routine. 

Now he could lift up Lysithea, which really wasn’t very impressive but it was a big step up from watching him struggling to put on his heavy cape. With Mercedes’ sleeping spells he was getting a solid nine hours a night whether he wanted it or not. He was crafty and would try to sneak away to do work but Edelgard had been insistent that he stop and just focus on getting better. So Mercedes enlisted the entire strike force as her spies; if they caught him doing any kind of bureaucratic nonsense they were to summon Caspar to pick Hubert up and physically return him to Mercedes. It was a challenge at first to ask for help, but once she did she found herself talking with everyone a lot more even if just to get status updates on everyone’s favorite curmudgeon. 

Weirdly, Mercedes was feeling better about herself too. She was happy looking at Hubert and not being able to see every bone in his body and realizing that was thanks to her. She felt guilty when she realized only Edelgard had done anything to observe his birthday and enlisted help to get him a gift to help lift his lowly spirits. This resulted in Peggles II — created with love by Bernadetta with each Black Eagle contributing some scrap of fabric from their clothes and gear to aid in its creation — a belated gift to make up for the fact that Hubert’s beloved pegasus stuffed animal had been left behind in Enbarr so it wouldn’t get destroyed. Everyone agreed he was notably less grumpy after receiving it and Mercedes swore he was having fewer nightmares. By the time they were ready to leave for Arianrhod, Mercedes was very proud to say that Hubert looked a little bit more like he had when the war had started and perhaps she felt that way too. 

***

They were finally fighting the Kingdom and Felix had requested to be in the front lines. Lysithea was safely in the rear, which was giving Felix the courage he needed right now. Last night they had tried to make love in their tent, but as Felix ran his fingers through her thinning white hair a noticeable chunk had passively come away. This had led to a lot of tears from her and then from him. He had ignored it for literally years that she was dying and convinced himself that Linhardt and Hanneman were the smartest people in Fodlan when it came to crests so obviously they would save her and Edelgard. However, they didn’t have a solution yet and Lysithea didn’t have a lot of time. 

If he could get rid of crests entirely, even if it hurt his ability to fight, he’d do it in a heartbeat. However, he didn’t have that option, so instead he was working to destroy the very system that promoted crests above all else: the church and the goddess damn kingdom. Then when that was done, if he was still breathing, he was going to kill all the fuckers that had done this to Lysithea in the first place. 

He took in a deep breath and looked at the Emperor, who was also in the front, right here in the open ready to embrace death. He admired Edelgard. It had taken him a long time to get to this place, but he knew she was as pissed off inside as he was. She didn’t just complain about crests and how bad they were like Ingrid and Sylvain had back in school, she was actually doing something about it. 

Felix looked up at the banners and his own crest stared back at him. His father was here. He saw Daphnel crest banners, so Ingrid was here too. He noted there was no Blaiddyd, Gautier or Dominic today. Apparently, there was some trouble brewing near Fodlan’s Locket. Even if Claude wasn’t coming through with aid from Almyra, Hilda Goneril had apparently convinced her brother to start wrecking havoc along the border of the kingdom and the old Alliance. The Goneril siblings were allegedly causing a shit ton of trouble, and it was reported a beefy blond guy and little glasses wearing archer were with them. Meanwhile a certain purple loving noble was given orders to march north with additional reinforcements with a plan to cut through the south eastern border of the Kingdom. If the main Adrestian force could take Arianrhod in the west, they would effectively have a pincer maneuver on the capital. If Claude did show, Dimitri was absolutely fucked in Felix’s opinion. The big question was would he surrender, or would he try to fight till the last. Felix couldn’t speculate because they had to survive today to even to get to that question. 

Edelgard would lead the main charge with the professor at her side, and Leonie at the professor’s side. They were heading towards Cornelia, the pink haired gremory in charge, who was going to have an unfortunate accident if Edelgard had her way. Felix was with Bernadetta and Dorothea as they exploited a side route. Meanwhile, Caspar, Linhardt, and Ferdinand were responsible for the other side of the city. Mercedes was in charge of babysitting Hubert and Lysithea in the way back, and even Marianne was with them lending auxiliary healing support. 

Felix and Dorothea exchanged grim smiles and a friendly tap of their swords. Dorothea sounded more confident than she looked, “You ready?”

“I’m always ready,” he promised as he gave a last look back to where Lysithea and Hubert were manning some seriously dark looking ballistas. They were going to bring down the outer wall with those things, a gift from the Agarthans, and then the charge would start. 

He braced himself as the purple light of dark magic launched against the walls with brutal force. It didn’t come down neatly, but the Adrestian forces were ready to rush and climb through the rubble to take this fucking city down. Felix was among the first to race into the unfriendly chaos that awaited them inside. 

Felix didn’t look at faces, he looked for Faerghus blue. He ran and cut and ducked and blocked as he made sure to fight at a pace that Bernadetta and Dorothea and the forces around them could keep up with. He had no desire to run and fight this army alone because he had lover to get back to when all this was done. 

Fate was cruel today. His father was on this side of the city, and it did not take Felix long before he was confronted with Rodrigue. 

“You abandoned your family, your friends, and for what, a girl?” demanded Rodrigue. 

Felix flicked his sword and watched the blood hit the white stone cobbles of Arianrhod. It was so much more complicated than his father could imagine. “I believe in the Emperor’s cause more than Dimitri’s maintaining the status quo.” 

Rodrigue shook his head in disbelief, “You would really have me fight you in the name of my king?” 

Felix spat upon the ground, “Who is leaving behind family now?”

Rodrigue looked at Felix like he was a lost cause, “Very well, you have left me no choice.” 

Felix rolled out of the way as his father cast a spell his way with the full force of his Frauldarian crest. “You’ve always had a choice!” Felix screamed it as he raced forward. As he yelled he wished Glenn had been raised to choose life over death. Felix had made his choice. 

His father’s horse was white. Felix painted it red. Felix screamed as he sent his sword up through his father’s chest, beneath the ribs, up through the heart. As he did it heard his own voice, raw and foreign on his ears, “Is this a glorious death to you?”

His vision was tunneled by his adrenaline as he pushed his father from his sword. There was no goddess. There was no forgiveness. Felix lifted his head as the sound of pegasus wing beat above him. 

Ingrid looked horrified as she stared at Felix. In the distance it seemed from the noise that Cornelia had fallen. Victory was all but assured. Felix frowned at Ingrid, “Get out of here while you still have a chance!”

“No!” shouted Ingrid, “You have betrayed everything I stand for! You betrayed your father, Dimitri, even, you’ve even betrayed Glenn!” 

“Don’t make me kill you Ingrid!” warned Felix, wishing she would fly the fuck out here. She never had a chance as Bernadetta lined up her arrow and let it fly straight at Ingrid’s pegasus. The mount was struck but not killed, and he watched in a panic as Bernadetta started to give chase after Ingrid as she turned her pegasus to get to the nearest roof for safety. 

Bernadetta was brave but not cruel. As soon as Ingrid was out of range Bernadetta was turning her horse back to return for Dorothea, who had exhausted herself casting too much. Bernadetta looked at Felix and his dead father, “Do you want to ride back with us?”

Felix looked at the fleeing kingdom soldiers and shook his head. “I need some time, to myself.” Bernadetta nodded and got Dorothea to the safety of some healers. 

***

Lysithea, Hubert and Mercedes walked through Arianrhod taking a death toll and finishing off enemy combatants. Caspar called them the clean up crew, which was rude but accurate. Mercedes was patching up Adrestian soldiers that could be saved while Hubert and Lysithea dealt with the killing.

Hubert and Lysithea were both interested in Cornelia’s lab. They were nearly there and now that she was dead, there was nothing to stop the two from ransacking the place. For Hubert this was a big moment; this was the highest ranking Agarthan they had seen killed since Solon. This was their chance to get a sense of what they might be up against when they finally took on Shambhala. He was far from alone in that sentiment. 

“Well that bitch has already taught us one thing,” muttered Mercedes darkly as she caught up to them. 

“And what would that be?” Hubert asked as he mired a fallen enemy into a permanent sleep. 

“They’ve been in the kingdom for decades, but not to help Adrestia, they’re working both sides,” said Mercedes. It was still only a hunch, they needed proof. They needed to get into that stupid lab and thankfully it was just ahead. Lysithea was nearly there. 

Something very loud and only getting louder caught their attention. “What the hell is that?” demanded Lysithea as she stared at the sky.

Hubert shielded his eyes against the brightness that was unnaturally lighting up the city from above. “I have no fucking clue.” Whatever it was, it was getting closer and quite quickly. All around them, the pillars of light started to fall. Hubert ran ahead to snatch Lysithea back as he watched a pillar heading right where Cornelia’s base of operations lay. 

The aftershock sent them flying. He crashed painfully with Lysithea in his arms as he wrapped himself around her slight frame. The world went from too bright to too dark in a split second. 

Hubert woke to Mercedes hands applying pressure to his side and green light of healing spells. Hubert rolled to his side and vomited blood. He managed a raspy whisper, “What the fuck?” He could barely hear above the persistent ringing in his ears. 

“You were internally bleeding,” shouted Mercedes breathlessly, “Now you’re not.” 

“Lysithea?” 

“Dislocated shoulder, but otherwise intact,” said Mercedes as she sat back and rested against the rubble that had fallen. She was sooty and bleeding, and Hubert realized he was too. 

Hubert sat up and could see Lysithea peering out at the wreckage. Cornelia’s lab was utterly demolished and with it any evidence of what the Agarthans had been doing in Faerghus. Hubert struggled to his feet to get a full look out at the devastation. Arianrhod was no more. 

***

Felix pulled himself free of the partially collapsed archway he’d been hiding under and took stock of the landscape. There were great fiery pits left in the ground where the pillars had hit. Around these pits were craters of destruction filled with gore from any unlucky souls that had been in the wrong place at the wrong time. Felix swore he could see the outline of people surrounded by ash against the remaining walls that still stood intact. He looked towards the building where Ingrid had landed her wounded pegasus and in horror realized it was no longer standing. 

Felix ran to where Ingrid might have been, and stopped short when he saw her fully. At first he thought she was leaning against a large fallen pillar. Then he realized she was being pinned down by it. Felix ran to try to push it off of her and it did not budge at all. Ingrid looked up at him and shook her head, “Don’t waste your energy.” 

Felix crouched down and breathlessly pushed her hair out of her face. Her left arm was trapped up to nearly her shoulder between the fallen chunks of stone. “I can get you out,” started Felix. 

“No,” yelled Ingrid. She looked at her trapped arm, “Don’t worry about me.” She grabbed his breastplate with her right hand and pulled his face to hers, “Get Glenn. Save him.” 

Felix looked at her in shock and then nodded, “Where do I find him?” 

“He’s in my tent, beyond the city, please, hurry,” begged Ingrid. It hurt more than anything to leave her there trapped in the rubble, but Felix had his orders. 

Felix’s brain was screaming as he looked at the collapsed tents littering the field beyond Arianrhod. The Kingdom’s camp was largely on fire, and the smoke swirling made it hard to see and breathe. People were running around in the chaos as soldiers and healers rushed back towards the devastation to recover whoever they could. He wasn’t wearing Imperial black so he slipped through unchallenged. Ash was falling from the sky as he paced through the camp looking for survivors. He saw the crest of Daphnel adorning a partially destroyed tent and Felix’s heart leapt as he pulled it open. Sylvain was not there, but someone else was. Felix braced himself as he crept towards the person crumpled on the floor in a uniform of Faerghus blue. 

It appeared to be one of Ingrid’s battalion troops. She was a slight pegasus flier whose neck had been broken as she fell from the blast. Felix felt bile in his throat as he turned her over. Her dying act had been to wrap her body protectively over a pile of blankets. When it stirred, Felix felt the greatest sense of relief he’d known since the war started as he uncovered Glenn, still alive. 

“If your parents survive this, I’m going to kill them for bringing you here,” said Felix as he picked up the baby in its blankets and held him close. Felix knew he didn’t have much time as he raced around the tent grabbing anything that looked even remotely baby related. When he found the sling Ingrid had been using he quickly strapped Glenn against his chest. He’d need his hands free to use his sword if the two of them were going to get out of here. 

He made his way back to where he had left Ingrid. She wasn’t there any more, but a stump of her left arm was still visible in the rubble surrounded by a great deal of blood. Felix felt nauseous as he thought about her having her limb amputated out here. 

Felix ran as fast as he could back towards the relative safety of the Adrestian side. It was nearly dark as he cross back through their perimeter, and finally felt safe to sheath his sword. Felix checked Glenn, and tried to draw as little attention as possible to the fact that he currently had a baby strapped to him. Lysithea was going to be very perplexed by this; they had never talked about having children, and she didn’t exactly seem into them. Whatever, hopefully this would be a temporary thing and Felix could get Glenn back to both his parents. 

As soon as he found Linhardt, predictably patching up Caspar, Felix grabbed him, “I need you now.” 

Linhardt scoffed at the order but motioned for Caspar to follow him as they trailed Felix into the nearby strategy tent. 

“Are you injured?” Linhardt didn’t sound especially concerned for Felix. 

“I need you to check him out, make sure he’s okay,” said Felix as he undid the sling, and gently unfurled the very squirmy baby onto the table. 

“Where did that come from?” Linhardt almost jumped back at the sight. 

“This is Ingrid and Sylvain’s son,” said Felix. “She told me where to find him, to save him.” 

Caspar was gently poking the baby, “What do we do with him?”

Linhardt started looking Glenn over, but it was pretty clear he’d never been up close to a baby ever with the way he moved him around. “Be careful,” growled Felix. 

“I am,” protested Linhardt as he turned him over. 

“For Sothis’ sake, support his neck,” bristled Felix as he took back Glenn who promptly began to wail. 

“Oh no, make it stop,” whined Linhardt as he covered his ears. 

Caspar launched into an ineffective barrage of funny faces that only made Glenn sob harder. Felix was at a loss for what to do as the cries got louder. 

“What are you fools doing in here?” demanded Hubert angrily as he walked into the tent. He might have been cleaned up but it was clear from the cuts and bruises on his face that he had been front and center for an explosion. 

Linhardt and Caspar started to talk at once as Felix tried to get Glenn to stop crying. Hubert looked at the baby and then at Felix wildly as he put together what was happening. 

“Give me that,” snapped Hubert as he took the child off of Felix. Felix wanted to hold on but he couldn’t risk pulling Glenn too much and Hubert was pretty unrelenting as he wrestled the baby from Felix’s grip. 

Hubert didn’t do baby talk, he didn’t seem capable of such nonsense, but he did speak in hushed comforting tones to the child. “Yes, you are allowed to be upset.” It was a disturbing sight to see the scary tactician holding a baby to his chest and rubbing its back as he softly bobbed him up and down, “You have had a very terrible day, you are hungry, in need of a diaper change, and a bath.” 

Caspar was watching Hubert slack jawed, “You like babies? But they’re so loud, and smelly!” 

Hubert rolled his eyes as he continued to soothe the tiny baby, “They’re loud when they’re upset, and only smell when they’re neglected. What’s your excuse?” Hubert looked at Felix intently, “What’s it’s name again?”

“Glenn,” said Felix weakly as he watched the scene. 

Hubert sighed as he gently peeled the infant off his chest to look at Glenn’s now calm face, “Glenn, now that is a choice. How does your father feel about that?” Hubert was moving the child towards and away from his face while making the strangest facial expressions. Glenn seemed rather amused by this, “Named for your mother’s late fiancee? Could have been worse I suppose, at least they didn’t name you after fucking Miklen.” 

“Hubert, you can’t say that to a baby,” hissed Linhardt. 

Hubert smirked, “You can actually say whatever you wish, you just must do it nicely.” He sat down and laid Glenn in his lap, and proceeded to play with his tiny feet eliciting gurgling sounds of contentment. “Isn’t that right Glenn? You have no fucking clue what I’m talking about.” 

“This is too weird,” muttered Caspar. 

“If it’s so disturbing to you then make yourself useful and get him something to eat,” said Hubert harshly. He caught himself and looked back at Glenn and spoke again in calming tones, “Yes, Uncle Hubert is going to teach these morons how to handle you properly.”

“Uncle Hubert,” repeated Felix in disbelief. 

“What the hell do you know about children?” asked Linhardt making sure to keep his voice saccharine. “I assumed you were more likely to eat a baby than elect to hold one.” 

“Long ago, this was part of my training Before learning to kill, I had to learn how to care for the imperial family, especially the smallest, most vulnerable members,” said Hubert fondly as he settled Glenn into a comfortable position in the crook of his arm and even let the baby chew on his ungloved finger. It would appear tender if it were anyone else. He started delegating, “Caspar, seriously, go get him food. We’ll start with whatever fresh milk you can get your hands on. Felix, I need you to cut up a uniform and make it into some diapers. Linhardt, get me a basin of warm water, but make sure it’s not too hot.” 

“And what are you going to do?” asked Felix as he watched Hubert still weirdly doting upon the baby. 

“I’m writing a letter to our enemies,” said Hubert grumpily. “We’re not babysitters, they need to come fetch him.” 

  



	10. At the end of the world, pt 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A calm before the storm as the black eagles prepare to march to the Tailtean plains

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things are starting to get really self-referential in this series as it draws to the end of what's still part of the canon timeline. This chapter references events of Dark Mage Road Trip, and earlier references were made to Monica von Ochs Must Die 
> 
> Also, I had to split up the road to Tailtean/Fhirdiad into parts because ugh so much happening at the end game

There were Secrets that were critical to keep because they involved matters of state and people’s lives, and then there were secrets that were secrets only because no one ever asked. Edelgard’s identity as the Flame Emperor had to be kept a capital S Secret in school. The fact that Hubert loved babies was just a lower case s secret. It wasn’t like he was going to go around shouting about it, but Hubert was highly tolerant of children under the age of six. They required constant care and attention, needed to be protected, and were pure and innocent. Literally nothing checked Hubert’s boxes like a baby in his care.

However this secret had its advantages. Glenn was a much needed morale booster after losing a third of their forces in Arianrhod, and Hubert secretly hoped that his letter saying that he, Lord Vestra, was overseeing Glenn’s care was like a big canon ball through the morale of the Kingdom forces. It was good they didn’t know that a well placed baby was very disarming to him. He hoped instead they thought he was picking out a spit for roasting poor little Glenn over a campfire. In reality the worst he was trying to do was teaching Glenn to gurgle “Hail Edelgard”, which was totally not working although he had heard a gurgle that sounded suspiciously like “fuck” so he had to concede that maybe babies were more perceptive than he gave them credit for and he ceased saying bad words in Glenn’s presence.

“Who doesn’t like babies?” asked Hubert rhetorically as he looked down at Glenn who was positively adorable. Marianne was enchanted too and playing with Glenn’s little feet.

“Me, I don’t like babies,” said Lysithea flatly as she watched them. Both of the dark mages faces were comically red right now because they had gotten mildly burned when the pillars dropped in Arianrhod. It made her look even angrier than usual.

“What? You like cute things,” whispered Hubert in horror as he covered Glenn’s ears while Lysithea gave the baby unwarranted side eye.

“Yeah, baby animals—” started Lysithea.

Hubert interrupted her by whispering, “Oh, baby pegasi.” He and Marianne made eye contact as she nodded enthusiastically and Hubert smiled because after six years he had finally found his common ground with Marianne. It should have been obvious to him, for who could possibly resist the fluffy down coat of a pegasus foal? It was probably the pillar-burn, but his face was pleasantly warm just imagining the tiny creatures trying to fly for the first time.

Lysithea tugged at Hubert’s sleeve, “Have you lost your mind?”

The answer was _maybe_ as he envision Glenn riding a baby pegasus, and Hubert knew he had to get a move on. “Am I paying too much attention to Glenn and not enough to you, my other favorite baby?” asked Hubert sweetly as he passed the chubby boy to Marianne. He had made a list of people who could hold Glenn (literally almost anyone who asked nicely) and those who could not (Caspar, Linhardt, and now Lysithea). Dorothea was only allowed to hold him under supervision because she had already attempted to kidnap Glenn twice now, and Hubert was pretty sure she’d be on a horse back to Garreg Mach in a heartbeat to ‘save him’ if they didn’t keep an eye on her.

However Hubert was also painfully aware of Thales’ attention right now, so he was trying not to appear very attached to Glenn lest the Agarthans get any ideas about how to coerce him. He also had a job to do and Glenn was very distracting. Therefore Marianne was elevated to chief baby minder. She was careful and kind, and also not homicidal, which was a rare commodity at this point in the war.

Lysithea looked disgruntled, “Felix is just whacking his sword against a tree. You need to go talk to him.”

Hubert sighed, “You’re his partner, can’t you help him work through this?”

“I tried,” said Lysithea desperately, “But you’re the only other person who has committed patricide!”

Hubert would have preferred no one else joined the killed-their-father club, but here they were. “Fine,” grumbled Hubert as he prepared to speak to Felix.

Understandably, Felix was messed up. He had brutally killed his father, watched one of his closest friends get horribly injured with no knowledge of if she had survived, and had heroically rescued a baby only to have him placed in more capable hands because Felix knew precious little about kids. Soon they would march to the Tailtean plains to surely kill off the rest of his old crew. All in all, Felix was in a bad place.

Felix was ineffectively chopping down a large tree on the edge of their camp with his sword. Hubert sighed, “You’re going to break the sword. Stop.”

Felix spared a growl and returned to chopping. Hubert looked at Lysithea and she pushed him towards Felix. Hubert folded his arms, “This isn’t a feeling that you can train away.”

Felix grunted and slowed but did not stop chopping. Hubert took a deep breath, “I’m not one for condolences, so I don’t have any for you.” Lysithea was drawing her finger across her throat at Hubert but he continued anyway, “Most patricide is the result of bad parenting. Most bad parenting is the product of culture norms, so let’s go remake Fodlan so that instead of being our bad fathers we can be good ones who won’t get killed by our own kids.” He gave Felix an encouraging swing of his fist.

“Hubert,” said Felix in a monotone, “Fuck off.”

Hubert tossed his hands up at Lysithea, “I tried. I don’t know why you think I’m the person to go to for this.” He had another appointment anyway.

“No, please fix him,” begged Lysithea as she grabbed onto Hubert’s leg and sat on the ground so he couldn’t get away.

Hubert shook her off his leg, “Fine. Felix, when I killed my father I isolated myself, stopped sleeping, and started experiencing psychosis that caused me to accidentally almost kill myself, remember?” Felix paused his chopping and stared at Hubert. “Do you recall what you all did to help me?”

“We just ate lunch in your room,” shrugged Felix.

“Yes, you came to me, all of you, and showed me that I still have a wonderful family of my choosing to surround myself with. This family has only gotten stronger over the last five years. So please, stop abusing that tree and come back to camp and surround yourself with people who love you and want to help you,” said Hubert in annoyance.

“Please,” added Lysithea with a sniffle that really effectively broke Felix.

Felix looked at his super ruined sword that he had killed Rodrigue with and then aggressively sank the blade into the ground, “I don’t want to use that sword anymore. I don’t think I can.”

“We’ll get you a new one, hell, we’ll get you two, just please come eat dinner with everyone,” said Hubert as he and Lysithea coaxed Felix from the tree and back to their camp.

Mercedes was not subtly dropping large amounts of butter into whatever she was making. Hubert begrudgingly accepted now that yes, butter made food better, but he was also the fattest he’d been in his adult life. His cheek bones almost looked nice and Hubert was a little dismayed by the realization that he could have probably looked a lot handsomer for the last decade if he’d just indulged in some sweets now and then. He’d quickly learned to stop telling Mercedes that he was feeling fat because she would either pinch him, hard, or she would pretend to cry because she was eating the same food with him and if he was fat, what did that make her? That actually managed to make him feel really bad because she was a very convincing fake crier.

“Are you trying to give me a heart attack?” asked Hubert weakly as he watched.

“A heart attack would require a heart,” smiled Mercedes pleasantly. She added in more butter and lots of salt.

“That’s rich coming from you,” said Hubert dryly.

“If you’re just here to bug me—” started Mercedes.

He was not, although he was enjoying the time they had been forced to spend together. Hubert hadn’t really had anyone taking care of him since he was six and it was incredibly nice to have someone, even though Mercedes was being paid handsomely to do this, that was actually watching out for him. He hoped he made Edelgard feel this way.

“The Emperor would like to have a chat with us,” said Hubert.

“Oh,” said Mercedes as she pulled the mashed medley from the fire. She dished out two bowls and then hesitated, “Do you think Edelgard wants some?”

“I’m sure it’s delicious but no I do not think she’ll want any,” said Hubert as he clutched his warm bowl. He had a duty to protect the Emperor from clogged arteries, so she couldn’t eat this.

Edelgard was in a state of casual dress as they entered her private tent. No glittering gold horns, no crimson red armor, no emperor frown. “I want you to sit.”

That made Hubert very much want to stand but Mercedes pushed him into a seat and started eating. Edelgard smiled warmly, “I’m glad this is working out. I think you are both doing a little bit better.”

Mercedes gave Hubert a very fake smile which he returned with his own.

Edelgard sighed and looked at the flap of her tent, “What I’m about to show you is going to upset you, so please try to contain yourselves.” She pulled out a box and revealed an artificial crest stone, “Thales presented this to me at Garreg Mach, and encouraged me to use this when taking on Rhea.”

Before Hubert could express the freak out happening inside him Edelgard continued, “As much as Arianrhod was a punishment for removing Cornelia, I think he is attempting to force my hand by trying to remove people close to me so that I feel desperate enough to use this.” Edelgard closed the box containing the crest stone, “If I remove Dimitri and Rhea while removing myself, it will create a massive power vacuum, and that is surely the Agarthans’ aim.”

“Then you cannot be at that fight,” said Hubert.

“I can’t withdraw from the fighting Hubert,” said Edelgard in disbelief. “We just lost a full third of our forces in Arianrhod, for me to leave now would destroy us.”

“Dimitri’s sole aim is to kill you,” whispered Hubert. That was what his spies told him again and again. Dimitri struggled to address Edelgard as anything other than “she” or “that woman” for years and still never used her name, usually only calling her the Emperor at his most polite moments. “He blames you for the Tragedy at Duscar, even though you were what, thirteen? He’s out of his mind—”

“Enough Hubert,” whispered Edelgard. “We work complicity with the people responsible for that. He’s not entirely wrong to be angry.”

“Complicity,” Hubert could not hide the rage in his voice. “You were complicit when they cut you open? When they killed your siblings? He survived what they did to him, you are dying because of it. And he has the gall to blame you for it like you asked for this. He is a fool who harbored fucking Cornelia in his army. He is complicit too!” Edelgard attempted to cut in and Hubert silenced her with a look, “The only choice we’ve made in this is each other, you and me, till the end.” He got up to pace lest he throw his bowl of dinner at the ground. He looked down at Edelgard, “You were forced upon this path, and so I have fought to clear it for you. Fhirdiad is no different. Let me clear the way.”

“Hubert, you are looking better, but even at your best, you are no match for Dimitri with his crest and his relic. Focus on the fights you can win. Focus on Dedue,” ordered Edelgard. Hubert bristled even though it was completely true that without a crest he was limited in his utility, especially in this fight.

Hubert frowned, “I can still be your shield.”

Edelgard sucked in an annoyed breath, “I will have the professor at my side. I will not fall to Dimitri. And you will be nowhere near me.” As Hubert started to protest, Edelgard looked at Mercedes, “I need you to leave my side as well. The Tailtean plains are large and dangerous, so I want the two of you protecting the strike force, not me.”

“I don’t like this,” hissed Hubert.

“Obviously,” said Edelgard. “Divide the strike force between the two of you and work to clear the plains while the professor and I take on Dimitri.”

***

The strike force had gathered themselves around a fire. Bernadetta had somehow made marshmallows, which Dorothea was perplexed by because she had no idea how someone would even begin to cook those, yet here they were. Caspar had about six skewers in between his fingers as he toasted the marshmallows up to perfection. There was cocoa because even though it was getting to be late spring, Faerghus was much colder than anyone wanted it to be.

Dorothea had Glenn and all was right with camp as far as she was concerned. She turned the baby to Marianne, “I know he has Ingrid’s hair coloring but that is 100% Sylvain’s face.” She turned Glenn back and swore he winked at her, “Oh my, what a flirtatious little man you are.” He chewed on his hand and kicked his tiny feet and Dorothea wished Ingrid and Sylvain would have ten more. Maybe she could put an order in for one.

Felix groaned at her and Dorothea took a deep breath and did the right thing, and passed him the baby. She helped him get his hands into the right position so that Glenn didn’t fuss and gave him two big thumbs up as he looked down at Sylvain’s spitting image. Lysithea looked dubiously at the baby and shook her head and chose to curl up against Dorothea instead. Dorothea tried to be very careful as she cuddled with Lysithea. Her shoulder had been dislocated in the blast and was still bruised and sore, her face was sunburned, and no one was talking about it, but her hair was falling out.

Dorothea beamed as she watched Bernadetta snuggling against Ferdinand. They were too cute (Glenn was obviously cuter, but still). Dorothea had been trying to give Bernadetta helpful bedroom tips, but that generally caused Bernadetta to squeak and suddenly have somewhere else to be. Ferdinand was such a perfect gentleman all the time that Dorothea had trouble picturing him doing anything remotely dirty. She was pretty sure at this point, they had kissed, and nothing more and that was perfect for them.

Dorothea tried to savor these memories of the war as much as she could. Laughter, cocoa and flaming marshmallows because Caspar had a two second attention span, tiny babies and thinking about friends’ engagements; these were much better than thinking about tomorrow morning when they would start to march. Mercedes and Hubert were storming out from Edelgard’s tent clearly having a hushed argument. Linhardt rolled his eyes, “Oh dear, the moms are fighting.” Everyone giggled at that except Dorothea. Dorothea had lost her mother when she was young, and then she had lost the closest person she had to filling that role when she was older.

Dorothea took out Manuela’s flask to pass around. She missed Manuela so much; she had been a friend, a mentor, and a stand in mother when Dorothea so badly needed one growing up. Manuela would insist it was more like, _“Older sister, and not that much older!”_ but she had definitely been ‘mom’. Dorothea’s mom had stuck with her Golden Deers when the war broke out. She had died in some shit show battle no one was going to remember in ten years, a stupid skirmish that no one was going to write a ballad about. Surely, no matter the outcome in Fhirdiad, there were going to be multiple songs about it.

Manuela deserved a fucking opera. She was never going to get one. As the flask returned to her, Dorothea took a too long drink. She forced a smile like she always did but if she kept drinking she was going to end up singing really sad songs that no one wanted to hear. Dorothea screwed the cap very tightly onto the flask and buried it back in her pocket and decided she couldn’t handle being hungover for marching tomorrow.

She sighed and tapped Felix impatiently on the arm, “Okay I’m going to need that baby back now.”


	11. At the End of the World, pt 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Let's get this party started. Felix gets rid of a pesky baby, Lysithea celebrates fish-mas in July, and the retainers have a reunion.

Felix hadn’t expected to come back to Fhirdiad like this with a baby strapped to his chest and two new swords at his back. He could see Sylvain walking towards him holding a great big white truce flag. On the march to the capital, Hubert would forever be known as the selfless hero who bravely fought off the scheming villain Dorothea “Baby Hog” Arnault so that Felix could get some quality bonding time with his brother’s namesake. It had paid off and now Uncle Felix could handle baby Glenn just as adeptly as Uncle Hubert.

Felix glanced down at Glenn and then because he was pretty sure no one could tell what he was doing, planting a quick kiss on the baby’s head, “Okay Glenn, well, you’re never going to remember this shit show, but I hope I get to meet you someday when you are old enough to remember me.”

Sylvain arrived looking less easy going than usual and much more tired as he gave Felix a weak smile. “We heard what happened in Arianrhod.”

“From Ingrid?” asked Felix hopefully.

Sylvain nodded, “Yeah, she’s, well, her arm’s off, but she’s making the most of things, she always does. I sent her home to Gautier territory to recover.”

“Good, I’m glad she’s far away,” said Felix though the words were struggling to come out. He had never wanted to face Sylvain as an enemy on the field; they were best friends, and honestly, Felix couldn’t kill him. He hoped that Sylvain couldn’t kill him either. They’d made a promise to die together, but they never stipulated that it couldn’t be at each others hands.

“Dimitri’s very, uh, disappointed with you over Rodrigue,” said Sylvain awkwardly.

“Yeah no shit,” muttered Felix. “He was more a dad to the Boar, I mean, he was more a father to Dimitri than he was to me.” Felix paused and sighed, “I think a lot of people saw how much help Dimitri needed, how much pain he was in, and didn’t realize their own kids needed them too.” It wasn’t just him who suffered, Annette’s father had done the same exact thing in the name of honor.

Felix peered around his shoulder to see Dimitri and Dedue standing in the distance. They looked bigger than he remembered and he was really not looking forward to this battle. He returned his gaze to Sylvain. “I wish my Glenn could have met your Glenn,” said Felix as he started to undo the sling to finally give this party-crashing baby back to its father.

“Me too man, me too,” said Sylvain as he eagerly took back his kid. Sylvain was hugging Glenn close and starting to cry tears of relief. He gave a look over his shoulder back at the Kingdom forces, and then back at Felix. “If I defect right now, can you ensure our safety?”

Felix would personally ensure it, “Yes.”

“Okay, then I would like to formally surrender myself for the sake of my son,” whispered Sylvain.

“What about Ingrid?”

Sylvain’s mouth drew a thin line, “She doesn’t know I’m doing this.”

Felix nodded and then gestured for Sylvain to follow him. “Why are you doing this?”

Sylvain was holding Glenn close, “Because I don’t want to make the same mistake of losing my son because I’m serving a king.” He grinned weakly at Felix, “You know I did listen to you when you were ranting and raving for all those years. Even if Ingrid and Dimitri couldn’t hear you, I did.”

They walked straight to the Adrestian line and Sylvain was taken lightly as a prisoner. Sylvain bowed to Edelgard, even though Felix suspected that doing this wounded his friend’s pride. “Your emperor-ess-ness, I would like to formally surrender to your mercy.”

“I accept your surrender,” said Edelgard in surprise. “But what about your troops?”

“I am afraid I cannot control them at this point. I asked them to go home, but I’m sure some will stay,” said Sylvain with a mournful look to the distant Faerghian line.

“Understood.” Edelgard looked to Mercedes, “See to it he is taken back to the camp and kept under guard, then return to me.”

Mercedes nodded and took Sylvain by the arm. Felix breathed a sigh of relief and looked back to where Dimitri stood, alone now save for Dedue. Felix bowed his head to Edelgard, “Thank you.”

“Did you know he would do that?” asked Edelgard. Felix shook his head, he’d never expected that, but of all his friends Sylvain seemed the most in tune with him.

“No, but I’m fucking glad he did,” said Felix with relief.

“Oh my goddess, does this mean we get to keep Glenn?” Dorothea called out happily before everyone told her to shut up.

***

Mercedes was taking the mounted calvary, Ferdinand and Bernadetta, with her. Lysithea and Felix were paired together and would follow the path of the calvary. Hubert was on foot, with Petra providing aerial support, and Caspar, Dorothea just behind him. Linhardt and Marianne were stationed in a little raised fortified structure so they could see who needed healing. In the worst case scenario, Mercedes would be warping people back to them, and in a worst, worst case scenario Hubert would be physically warping with them.

Lysithea had a sack with her and was grinning as she looked at her fellow attack mages. She doing her best impression of the benevolent Saint Cethaleann who placed tasty fish in the stockings of good little girls and boys on Saint Seiros day. Parents had wisely swapped the fish for presents these days. Lysithea didn’t seem to mind that Saint Seiros day was literally many months away and they were marching to kill Serios, “Ho ho ho, merry let’s not die today!”

It was said bad children got a lecture from Saint Cichol instead of a fish, but Hubert had always preferred the legend of Saint Macuil, who just unceremoniously ate bad children. It was told that Saint Indech thought the whole holiday was stupid and refused to participate.

“For you Dorothea, a Levin sword!” Lysithea pulled it free and Dorothea gasped as she took it and did some mock stabs.

“For you Merce-death, you get a dark staff!” Lysithea had made more to replace the one Dorothea had accidentally broken in a really bad battle. Mercedes regarded it and then strapped it to her back. She also had her Rafail gem hanging from her neck, and was wielding Jeritza’s Scythe of Sariel. Hubert pitied the fool that crossed paths with Mercedes as an enemy today.

“For me, oh good, a big ass shield so I’m not toast,” she laughed as she pulled out a dark seal adorned shield. “And, none for you Hubert!”

Hubert never got presents on Saint Seiros day, not because he was bad but because his father didn’t believe in celebrating birthdays and holidays and certainly did not give presents. When he was very young Hubert had thought perhaps if he was just extra good his father might change his mind about presents, but he never did regardless of how well Hubert followed the Marquis von Vestra’s many rules.

“Just kidding, two for you Hubert! Here you go,” laughed Lysithea as she pulled free a weird looking pair of gloves.

“What are these?” asked Hubert dubiously as he slid on the black leather gloves glittering with what looked like little beads of dark seal material. Lysithea claimed she had found a way to make them not so poisonous but Hubert wasn’t sure he trusted her, although she wasn’t dead yet so maybe she had. He’d have to make sure not to rub his eyes with these just in case.

“I call them dark gauntlets! Because you love gauntlets, right?” She gave him a big smile and tossed her empty sack aside. “Let’s go kill some people.”

Hubert looked at his crew. Petra was giving Brutus the wyvern a pep talk, “You are allowed to be biting people today!” Caspar and Dorothea looked at Hubert trustingly, “The Emperor ordered us to take on Dedue.”

“Oh fuck, can I go with Mercedes?” begged Dorothea.

Hubert didn’t blame her, “No. You are critical, Dedue and his armored units are weak to magic, you have to stay.”

“Don’t worry, I gotch’ya back,” promised Caspar bravely as he latched on his own gauntlets.

Hubert really hoped Caspar would have Dorothea’s back because he had a sinking feeling Byleth’s time powers were going to be reserved for the lords today. If she couldn’t see the rest of them dying, she couldn’t turn back time to save them.

Caspar was waving the four of them and Brutus together, “Pre-battle hug time!”

“Did you have to put your gauntlets on before this?” demanded Hubert as he somehow got stuck in the middle with Brutus licking his head as if giving him a quick taste.

“Do not be eating Hubert,” warned Petra with a hiss at her mount. “Enemies only!”

Two hours later, Hubert was contemplating how being eaten by Brutus might not be such a bad way to go given the alternatives. Dorothea had gotten her way after all and had been co-opted by Mercedes to support Lysithea and Felix. They were cleaning things up across the field and nice and far away from the stupid armored hoard that Hubert and Caspar were currently fighting.

Caspar should have brought his hammer instead of his gauntlets but there was no pulsing back to make a new choice. Hubert didn’t see it happen, but he heard it loud and clear. There was a squishy crunch and Caspar was being thrown back, quite bloodied and quite disoriented. Hubert dropped who he was fighting with a violent spell and ran while trying to send up a weak fire flare to get Petra’s attention.

Brutus landed and roared at the approaching armored units and even snapped one or two into multiple bites. Petra, who had acquired a bolt axe was using it now as Hubert carefully pulled all of Caspar back together with his best healing spell. Unfortunately he was piss poor at white magic and Caspar was looking pretty ashen as all his blood tried to escape his body.

Caspar was chuckling weakly, and Hubert frowned, “Stop laughing! This is not funny.” Caspar was not really laughing at Hubert or the situation because he was very much in his own darkening world. Hubert yelled for Petra, “He needs to go back, now!”

“You’ll be alone,” said Petra. She saw Caspar and then stopped protesting as she readied to fly him away to safety and healers.

She had cleared many of the lingering enemies away, but not the big one in charge. Dedue hadn’t actually gotten any taller since school, but in his massive shiny armor he looked like a legendary hero stepping from the pages of a fairytale and Hubert, covered in Caspar’s blood, dripping in sweat and with the usual murderous glint to his too bright eyes definitely looked like a villain.

The two retainers regarded each other warily as they got ready to finally face off. Dedue looked stoic, calm even, with his many scars visible on his face. He wore them proudly, earned in service as a shield to his lord. Hubert’s scars were all hidden away under his clothes, the shameful marks of a weapon used far too often and only repaired when totally broken. Hubert was laughing because he couldn’t help himself.

“I never understood your sense of humor Vestra,” said Dedue as he lifted his devastating hammer. “What’s so funny today?”

Nothing was funny today, but Hubert always laughed as wickedly as possible as his last defense. It was better to let the enemy believe you were insane than scared. “I was just admiring your armor; it makes mine look like more of a fashion accessory if I’m being honest.”

“I’d ask for your last words, but I don’t really want to hear them,” said Dedue as he launched forward.

Hubert was glad that Mercedes had forced him to start running again as he dodged and darted around Dedue. He felt like mosquito trying to draw blood from a rhino who was quite good at swatting. Eventually the pesky mosquito finally hit Dedue with a Death spell. Dedue grunted, injured, but far from finished off. Dedue dropped his hammer and produced an object from his intricately woven Duscarian scarf.

“Don’t you fucking dare,” yelled Hubert in horror as Dedue held up an artificial crest stone.

“For Dimitri,” said Dedue resolutely as he cracked the stone with one hand. The transformation was rough and brutal to watch as Dedue’s skin crackled and hissed as if fire was lighting up beneath it. His armor tore away as his body changed. He was growing rapidly, and his spine bent and twisted until he was hunched over on all fours. His face had transformed into an armored wedge that looked ready to cleave the world in two.

Hubert gaped. Just as Dedue had been a giant among men, he was a giant among beasts. Hubert felt extremely poor about his ability to survive this. What had once been Dedue opened its mouth and gave a deafening roar attack that knocked Hubert back onto the ground. Hubert didn’t care to die this way, but as far as he was concerned he was doomed.

A flapping of wings, a flash of pink, a very bright relic axe. Hilda Goneril jumped from Claude’s wyvern and gave Dedue a mighty smack with her weapon, “Hey, pick on someone your own size!”

She jumped out of Dedue’s way and picked up Hubert, “Guess we’re never going to have that retainers threesome I suggested back in school.”

“You’re here,” managed Hubert in disbelief as she carried him bridal style as promised to the safety of a rocky outcrop. The sky was filling with Almyran wyvern riders and in the distance Lorenz’s forces were cutting in from the east.

She linked her pinky around his in a very strange Golden Deer hand shake, “Hell yeah I am Hubie, the Goneril’s are here to fight.”

She and Hubert peered above the rocks at Dedue who was demolishing any soldier that got in his range. She pointed to where her brother was hulking off in the distance with Raphael and Ignaz assisting. Holst Goneril was a man of impressive muscle mass and shockingly pink hair. “Holy shit, that’s your brother?”

Hilda grinned, “Yep, aren’t you glad I told him how nice you were to me?”

“Our kids really would be monsters,” whispered Hubert in disbelief as he looked at Hilda and wondered what the hell her parents looked like or if there was something questionable in the water around Fodlan’s Locket.

She flexed and punched him in the arm, “Let’s worry the future later. I think you and I are responsible for taking out Dedue.” Sure enough Claude was flying his way to Edelgard to confront Dimitri with the professor, leaving Hilda and Hubert to deal with the tough shit as usual. Hubert gulped as Hilda smiled nervously. They nodded at each other and then made a mad dash to do a combined assault on Dedue.

***

“This is hardly a fair fight,” called out Dimitri as Claude descended from his wyvern to walk with Edelgard.

Edelgard’s eyes swept around the field to see the demonic beasts breaking out from within the Faerghian troops. “Hardly,” she whispered as her hands tightened around her axe handle.

The Emperor and Almyran Prince advanced until they were just short of Dimitri’s frightening relic lance. The professor had out the sword of the creator, though she stood behind the lords and not at their side. She seemed to be searching for someone else.

“What point is there in conquering Fodlan when you have killed all its people?” shouted Dimitri. It was clear who he was addressing. He only had eyes for the Emperor.

Edelgard stared at him. They were not so different, “I am freeing the people, and I will not stop. We cut a path to a new dawn—”

Dimitri sneered at her, “Yours is a future built on a foundation of corpses and tears!”

Claude stared out at Dimitri, “Our present is built on that same foundation.”

The three of them were at an impasse.

“We come for Rhea, not for you Dimitri,” promised Edelgard.

“I swore an oath,” said Dimitri as he prepared to fight. “I will protect Seiros and the Church, as they protected me, until my last breath.”

“Then may that breath come soon,” hissed Edelgard.

She was told she had been fond of Dimitri in the year they spent together in Fhirdiad. She had hazy memories of her life before the experiments. Things came in broken bits and pieces of a terribly scary year spent being stolen from the palace in the night and smuggled away across Fodlan in secret. That was the year her mother had left her to try to find a new safe home for them. Edelgard never got to see Patricia again, and was left with her uncle. He was trying to negotiate terms with King Lambert who would come by with his son, but never his new wife. The terms were not going well, and when Dimitri would leave to go home and enjoy his life with her mother, Edelgard was left with Arundel trying to reassure her that things would calm down soon. Edelgard remembered missing Hubert and asking for him to come to visit. Arundel, the real one, told her sadly that Hubert couldn’t be her friend any more because the von Vestras had betrayed the von Hresvelgs, and Edelgard cried and refused to believe that Hubert would ever not be her friend. Then Arundel took a visitor that wasn’t the King and after that Arundel changed into Thales.

Dimitri had given her a dagger as a parting gift. A dagger that Thales had laughed at when she tried to stab him with it and run away. He told her that she was cute and promised she would be a fearsome Flame Emperor someday as he took her home. There, her siblings had already started to die. Hubert was grown up, unnaturally so, and had looked at Dimitri’s ineffective dagger and promised her something better. He had chosen to give her his life.

As the three lords clashed Edelgard saw Dimitri not as her clumsy child step-brother, not as her classmate, but as an equal on the field and an enemy to be cleared away at all costs.

***

Byleth saw Seiros and ran to her. Seiros stared at the professor with hate in her eyes, “Why do you insist on being such a loathsome obstacle? You stole my mother's heart and wield the Sword of the Creator. Just like that savage King Nemesis, I swear, with these very hands I will take her back! Until then, wait for me, dear Mother!”

For the first time in her many lifetimes, Byleth spoke not with her voice, but with that of Sothis. “Mother!”

Seiros’ eyes bulged, “Do not mock me you foul pretender!”

Byleth snapped her whip blade, “You dare invoke _my_ name to support your lies!” As Byleth stepped forward she no longer felt in control of her own body. It was like she was the one who was watching now as Sothis took over. “This bloodshed I have had to watch again and again. This mortal you put me in is a vessel of constant pain over repeating the same mistakes over and over again!”

Seiros stared at her in a mix of rage and disbelief. Sothis was not finished, “You tried to bring back that which is dead into something that does not understand fate no matter how much I must belabor the point. You tried to resurrect me with the crest stone, she tries to resurrect them by altering time. Both of you are wrong!”

“Mother?” whispered Seiros weakly.

Sothis tipped Byleth’s head back and let out a laugh. “I do not even remember you child. That is what you have returned from the peaceful slumber of death. A blank slate with the power of a god and the rage of a demon.” Sothis dropped Byleth’s eyes back to Seiros and lifted up the sword of the creator, “You fool. You put my power right into the hands of a human, what did you expect to happen?”


	12. At the end of the world, pt 3!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The gang regroups after clearing the Tailtean plains to find that, oh no, the professor is not with them.
> 
> Hubert confronts his school yard bully, Mercedes confronts her ex-best friend, and Dorothea almost got out of this war unscathed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I like how the comment consensus for the last chapter was Sothis is crazy, which was not my intention. The only crazy thing about her is how crazy mad she is about having to use her own bones to kill people.

The plains were burning as the combined Imperial and Almyran forces pushed back the Kingdom forces and Knights of Seiros to the gates of Fhirdiad. Edelgard and Claude stood silent over Dimitri. It was a sort of vigil, she supposed, a last meeting of the house leaders.

“Do you have any words to say?” asked Claude as his eyes traced traced from the fallen king, full of arrows and axe wounds, and up to Edelgard. It had taken the two of them working together to bring Dimitri down. Edelgard was grateful to share the burden, even though she had mentally prepared to do the task alone if Dimitri would not yield. She would have spared him if he relented, but he persisted. He was brave, he was proud, and he was haunted by his dead. How could he possibly live with their voices in his head if he had deigned yield to her, that woman, that thorn in his crown of wilting roses, twisting tighter into his skin with each passing year of the war? No, he could never bear to lose to her, therefore he had fought to the death. That it was his death instead of hers must have been a bitter surprise.

“Let the poets ascribe something memorable and apocryphal to us later,” she said sadly as she contemplated all the things she was feeling. She looked towards Fhirdiad where Seiros was retreating from the assault of the professor. “This battle is not over.”

Hilda and Hubert, supporting each other, limped up to meet their best friends. The two looked like hell, yet uncharacteristically chummy.

“Dedue?” Edelgard dared to ask.

Hilda shook her head and Hubert rubbed his ribs painfully, “He used a crest stone.”

Edelgard shut her eyes and took a deep breath. To use a crest stone like that was true desperation. She could only wonder what the conversations among the Kingdom’s forces had been like before this battle if Dimitri was willing to fight to the death and Dedue willing to knowingly sacrifice himself like that.

She took a deep breath and considered the siege they were going to have to lay on Fhirdiad. “Any idea if we’ve lost anyone?”

Edelgard and Hubert had known each other so long that they could communicate a lot with looks alone. Right now she did not like the expression on his face which was his dead eyed _“I do not want to tell you this”_ look that unfortunately she saw more often as the war continued. Edelgard pursed her lips, someone close then. “Right. We need to regroup, and quickly plan our assault.”

“Will we do this today, or wait until morning?” Hubert was looking at the fading light in the sky.

Fhirdiad answered with a roar; the Immaculate One in full glory surely lay within. Hubert ran his tongue along his teeth, “Today then. Understood.” He took a deep breath and offered Hilda his arm, “Shall we Ms. Goneril?”

“What?” she asked as she linked arms with him. “Where are we—”

She didn’t finish her sentence as Hubert warped them both away. Claude whistled for his striking albino wyvern to come over, “Your majesty,” he said as he extended his hand so they could ride back together.

He was her ally, and she had to trust him not to push her off once they got in the air. Hubert would lecture her later about this, but she wanted Claude to know they were equals and that she trusted him. Plus if Claude did try anything, well, Hubert had survived Dedue as a demonic beast, he could probably take out every Golden Deer. “People will talk about this later,” she said with a sigh as he pulled her up onto the mount.

Claude gave an empty chuckle, “I’m sure they’ll have a lot to say about what we’ve done today.”

***

“Out of my fucking way,” ordered Hubert as he slammed down rolls of paper onto the strategy table. Lysithea barely had time to grab her food before Hubert was circling strategic points on a rather large map of Fhirdiad. The tactician clearly had many scenarios prepared, but hadn’t really expected them to be facing dragon-Rhea from the start, nor had he anticipated Claude trying to tell him how to do his job.

“I’m a master tactician,” said Claude as he furrowed his brow at Hubert’s total lack of interest in his help.

“You’re a lord, go lord away somewhere else,” said Hubert territorially as he tried to shoo Claude away from the map.

Claude looked at Lysithea as if for back up and she held up a hand, “This is the guy who handed you your ass in Derdriu.” Claude looked pissed off as he walked away.

Hubert saluted her, “Good job number 2.”

“What, why am I not 1?” demanded Lysithea. They had a secret handshake! They were dark seal scar buddies! They talked about everyone and everything together.

“Edelgard is number 1,” growled Hubert as he scribbled away. Lysithea should have seen that coming.

“Who’s number 3?”

“Stop bothering me or you’ll be 3,” threatened Hubert as he glared at her for distracting him. He looked like he might actually mire her if she stayed; his bangs were curling he was so sweaty and Lysithea definitely didn’t want to know whose blood was all over him. Once Hubert’s hair was in full devil horn mode, every black eagle knew to stay the hell away from him.

Lysithea rolled her eyes and quickly chose another place to wolf down her between-battle snack. She weaved around Mercedes who was coming in hot and pissed off like a lady wyvern in heat. She looked like she had been literally bathing in the blood of her enemies. Felix was sitting with Sylvain, still a prisoner, and Lysithea didn’t really want to get in on their conversation about Dimitri and Dedue.

Lysithea spied Edelgard sitting on the ground in a way that was unbecoming of an emperor. Lysithea joined her, “Do you need a snack?”

“Yes, please,” whispered Edelgard as Lysithea shared her precious stash of fresh macarons. “Where did you even manage to get these?”

“I know two smugglers,” smiled Lysithea. Raphael had arrived with the Goneril forces, and had come with a literal wagon of food as his personal luggage. He and Ignatz were now making bank selling off all manner of black market snacks. For Lysithea, the macarons were a gift. Marianne had been gifted carrots to share with Dorte, and Leonie had gotten a big bag of jerky. Everyone else had to pay if they wanted that sweet, salty, Alliance good stuff.

“Do you think you could help me with this?” asked Edelgard as she tried to get her horns off.

Lysithea jumped up to help and found the crown very weighty. She helped guide it as Edelgard did most of the heavy lifting. Lysithea could not help but notice the unusual amount of strands of long white hair that came with the crown. “Are you losing your hair too?” asked Lysithea quietly.

Edelgard looked up at her sadly and nodded, “Please do not mention it to Hubert. He worries too much.”

Lysithea bit her lip as she sat and pulled her knees up to her chin, “Does the professor know?”

Edelgard sighed, “She’s optimistic there’s a fix. But I’m not going to worry her over this, not while we’re at war.”

“Where is the professor anyway?” asked Lysithea as she glanced around.

No one apparently knew where Byleth had gotten to.

***

Hubert was pressing his fingers into his eyelids. Maybe if he just kept pushing, he could go blind and not have to deal with this shit. “Let me get this straight, she chased Seiros into Fhirdiad, alone.”

Mercedes’ face was grim, blood stains notwithstanding, “I tried to stop her, she told me, quote, ‘I heard your half-assed prayer, you’ll get yours’ and then snapped her sword at me. So yes, I let her go into Fhirdiad alone.”

“Half assed prayer?” repeated Hubert in confusion.

“I prayed to Sothis for some revenge, and told her to go to hell if she wouldn’t give it to me,” said Mercedes through gritted teeth.

Hubert looked at his carefully laid plans and because it was cathartic, launched a fire spell at the map, “Fuck it, I guess we’re just going to have to go in there and get her.”

They were taking Fhirdiad. Hubert vaguely wondered what would happen to them if the professor was dead, or worse, jumped back through time. Would they just snuff out of existence if she snapped and decided to scrap this timeline? That was very frightening, he had plans for after the war like a nice vengeful vacation/work trip to Shambhala. Maybe they could just keep on living out their miserable lives without her, and other Huberts and Edelgards could have their own shot at pleasing the professor’s impossible standards with the outcome of this war. Hubert frankly didn’t feel like it was fair that he, or some version of himself, had to keep dying over and over again until she got her way. He was pissed off that if his dreams were real, someplace, or perhaps more accurately in some time, he and Petra got live happily ever after in Nuvelle, no break up, no painful gauntlet injury. Some other Hubert was in love with Ferdinand! Although maybe some other Huberts had brain tumors because who could stand spending that much time around Ferdinand? Maybe that Ferdinand was magically not as annoying in that time, although Hubert found that doubtful. These Huberts seemed happy, but did they get to stay happy when the professor wasn’t?

This Hubert was very much not happy. Fhirdiad was already on fire when they got there courtesy of one giant angry dragon. The Immaculate One had razed large sections of the Kingdom capital and Hubert wondered if Dimitri was rolling around waiting on his grave to be dug. This was a poor payback for the King’s loyalty: Rhea had demolished his city and surely all the civilians inside. In Hubert’s Enbarr-oh shit-contingency plan he had some controlled fires that would be strategically set, but at places like the opera house because people didn’t live there!

“Okay, objective one, find the professor,” said Claude, again overstepping into Hubert’s role. “And objective two, finish Rhea.”

Hubert clapped slowly. “Wonderful. Thank you your majesty.” He looked at the worried group. “Former Golden Deers, take the east stretch fight your way forward. Strike Force,” or at least those that were left, “Go up the middle supporting and protecting the Emperor. Mages, with me, we’re going up the west corridor.” He had a lance because frankly, he was exhausted from using so much magic and he was afraid he was going to tap out if he didn’t kill some Church soldiers the old fashion way.

They had their orders, they had no time to plan out anything better. Mercedes, Lysithea, Dorothea, and Hubert made their way west. There were quite a few mechanized golem like creatures that could throw lightning. Objectively he liked these things; they were very interesting and he really wanted to understand the mechanisms that powered them. Were they operated by a person, or magically sentient enough to decide who to kill? Subjectively however Hubert fucking hated these things and goddess damn there were a bunch!

Up ahead of them on this side was a familiar face holding the line. Annette Dominic. She looked scared shitless as she stood there. She wasn’t known to be particularly religious and according to Felix, her dad was a sort of deadbeat devoted to Dimitri. She was here for family that hadn’t bothered to be around for her. However, Hubert had a great deal of trouble feeling bad for her.

Hubert had been bullied a lot as a teenager: by soldiers, by politicians’ dumb kids, by Slithers sent to train him and Edelgard, and most of all by his unrelenting father. At Garreg Mach, Annette Dominic, innocent Annette whom everyone loved and adored, was Hubert’s biggest bully. She made up delightful jingles and ditties about chores and dining hall meals, and of course, her classmates. The ones for her dear blue lions were so nice and pleasant, for everyone else, Annette was a clever rhymer out for blood. Since Hubert was so adept at lurking unseen, he had gotten an uninvited front row to a number of these, including Annette’s “Hubert is the Worst Student at Garreg Mach”. If memory served, the chorus went along the lines of “Hubert’s always really mad, because his hair’s so fucking bad; Hubert’s eyebrows are way too thin, and you’ll be screwed if you see him grin; Hubert’s such an awful guy, maybe he’ll just go and die!” Yeah, fuck Annette Dominic.

***

When Mercedes didn’t see Annie out on the Tailtean plains she had been extremely happy. She hoped Annie had finally worked up the courage to tell her dad to fuck off, and then hopefully had run far away from this stupid war. However, Annie was here helping hold Fhirdiad. Mercedes heart broke as she saw how terrified Annie looked. Annie was strong, she was a good mage, but she was also stranded alone out here expected to hold off a lot of invading enemies. Rhea was indifferent to the kingdom forces, and no one had Annie’s back.

Dorothea sent meteor directly at Annie, who mercifully managed to roll and dodge out of the way and only got hit by a few small flaming rocks. She popped up full of fire and fight and blasted off a spell directly at the songstress who turned and tried to run out of the blinding path of the magic sent her way.

Dorothea screamed as Annette’s Sagittae spell ripped across her back in a nearly direct hit. She was down. She was very down. Mercedes saw Hubert beginning to go for Annette in a vengeful rage. Mercedes could not let him go after Annie and so instead she cast her sleeping spell at her before warping into Hubert’s path. He crashed down beneath Mercedes’ weight, “What are you doing?”

“I handle Annie, not you,” said Mercie darkly. “You need to warp Dorothea to safety.”

She watched as he begrudgingly pushed past her and grabbed Dorothea before warping away. With relief Mercie ran to Annie, picked her up and warped her far, far away from this terrible place. She couldn’t take her to the Adrestian lines, that was too risky, so she took her just beyond the city and hid her in a nice thicket. It was safe, and Annette would wake up in approximately 30-60 minutes and would hopefully have the sense not to run back into the hellhole that was Fhirdiad. Mercie kissed Annie on the forehead and whispered a quiet apology, and then Mercedes warped back to battle, ready to kill anyone in her way.

***

Hubert landed with Dorothea still crying in his arms. While he hated to hear her in so much pain, it meant she was still alive. “Hey, hey we’re almost there,” he promised softly as her fingers dug into his crusty blood soaked uniform. She was cringing and gasping as he tried not to touch her wound. It was hard to avoid the three big gashes that traced from her right shoulder down to her left hip. He wouldn’t tell her this right now, but this was definitely going to leave a mark. She was always fretting about cuts and bruises and how her skin looked, and this was going to be a giant, unavoidable brutal scar.

“Can you feel your legs?” He had no gods to pray to but he hoped on his life she was not paralyzed.

“I can feel your hand on my ass,” she managed between sobs.

“That’s a start,” said Hubert weakly as he assessed the healing area.

Linhardt was doing his job, but his eyes told a different story. He was going through the motions and not really thinking. There was a lot of blood on him: up his arms, on his face, in his hair. Linhardt was not going to be available for a while.

Hubert kissed Dorothea as gently as possible on the side of her head to comfort her. What could he possibly say to her? She had started at Garreg Mach as one of the only people not afraid of him, and frankly seeing right through him for the dramatic actor that he was. They had detention almost every day together. He lost his virginity to her. They had each others’ back in battles good and bad. He’d even had a crush on her for a long time but never knew how to explain that instead of just casually sleeping together he’d really like to take her on a date some time. Then the Emperor had beat him to the punch and Hubert quietly arranged dates for them instead because it was his duty and Edelgard was a much better romantic option than he was.

So he just said what he always did, “I’ll see you on the other side of this.”

“Promise?” she asked softly.

“Always,” whispered Hubert as he brought her to Marianne who didn’t look quite as detached from reality as Linhardt.

Lysithea was riding a mechanical golem when they got back. “You assholes left me alone out here!” Instead of trying to beat it, she had figured out how to man it. Hubert and Mercedes barely had a chance to get out of the way as Lysithea sent some lightning bolts at their feet.

“We’re sorry,” they both cried out as they danced and weaved out of her way.

Lysithea grunted and raised the mechanical arm of the golem towards the Immaculate One, “Come on I’ve located the professor! I hope she’s just passed out, ‘cause she’s laying on the ground up there!”

***

The world was darkness as Byleth sat across from Sothis. “Oh child,” whispered Sothis in a mature way, though she herself still appeared in her juvenile form. She seemed wiser now than when they had first spoken so many lifetimes ago. Her green eyes danced with the devilish glint of knowledge of the beyond. She was a wolf in sheep's clothing: something ageless, no, timeless, that chose to appear like an innocent child. Perhaps Byleth was finally seeing Sothis as she really was for the first time. Not a ignorant child but a creature that lived the past, present, and future all at once. A creature that knew to choose a facade that could be underestimated, even loved, rather than ever show her true face.

“We can still fix this,” started Byleth. “If you transform me—”

The corner of Sothis’ lip lifted revealing a canine that looked much pointer than Byleth remembered it ever being. “I told you, the world is not yet ready to see my true form.” Sothis cocked her head and her braids danced as if gravity were an afterthought, “Besides child, you would not survive me. None of you would. My other name is Fell Star, and that is the form I save for the Ending.” She smiled broadly a for a second Byleth glimpsed the world being snapped up into the jaws of the great wolf that sat before her looking like a happy go lucky youth.

“Then sacrifice me, to save them,” begged Byleth. Her life was pointless without her friends, better to give it to them so that they might live. “Just take it all back and make it right!”

“What is my name,” asked Sothis with a knowing stare.

“Sothis,” parroted Byleth.

“What does that mean,” Sothis’ voice was so very calm.

“The Beginning,”

“Yes, the Beginning. The only way to stop all of this is to go all the way back. The way, way back. And then these people you have come to love would never live. Is that your choice?” Sothis’ eyes glittered with intent; she would destroy it all and go back to the nothingness that exist before if Byleth wished it so.

“No,” whispered Byleth softly. “Then all of this would have been for nothing.”

“Indeed.” Sothis paused and licked her lips. Byleth realized in all this time Sothis had not blinked once. “I am going to give you a gift, though, it may take you many years to see it as such. There is a chance you will never see it that way,” warned Sothis. “I am going to leave you human. Normal, with a beating heart.”

“But time—” Byleth began to protest but her voiced was silenced as Sothis shook her head. This wasn’t a negotiation: this was a goddess informing a vessel of her divine will.

“Time moving in one direction, that is the way of the world for everyone else. It is much like walking backwards; you can only move ahead, and only see the path you’ve already tread. Humans must live with and reconcile the present and the past, and approach the future blind. They can only change today and tomorrow, never yesterday,” said Sothis with the patience of a goddess.

Then Sothis conjured up a sea of memories, joyful snippets in time: Jeralt and his pregnant wife looking happy, teenage Seiros playing a childhood game with a young Cichol in the streets of Zanado, Edelgard and Dimitri learning to dance, Byleth getting her first knife, Lonato reading Ashe a book about knights, young Leonie following Jeralt around carrying a bunch of lances while he tried to shake her off, young Ingrid mortified as young Sylvain chatted up her grandma, Flayn learning to fish.

“They say things happen for a reason. I don’t know who ‘they’ are, but I’m telling you right now, those fools are wrong. People say stuff like that to make themselves feel better, and to make bad things seem less so. However, sometimes things just happen, and that’s the way it is, and there’s no reason at all,” said Sothis as each memory shifted from joy to sorrow. Byleth saw her mother dying so she could live, she saw Seiros watching the destruction of her homeland, ten year old Hubert hiding under his bed and sobbing alone into a stuffed pegasus, Jeralt watching Byleth making her first kill, Ashe and Lonato getting the news about Christophe, Leonie learning Jeralt had died, Sylvain comforting Ingrid when they learned about the Tragedy at Duscar, Flayn watching Seteth fall.

“Life is dead mothers, dead fathers, even dead children sometimes. Life’s not being able to bring them back. Life’s a lot of pain, and sadly some lives are more painful than others, but that isn’t a reason to stop time.” Sothis stood and offered a hand to Byleth to pull her up. “The world is very dark, and the best you can do is find your light, and try to make it brighter. And if you can do that, then you can help others do the same,” whispered Sothis as the memories faded away into blackness once more. “So, we’re going to end this, for real this time, and tomorrow you’ll wake up and have to deal with the pain. I’m not letting you run back any more. You’re going to have to start facing your emotions, even the ones that hurt, and move forward from all this.” The crest of flames was time. It was a continuous twisting path, and it had a beginning and an end. This was Sothis. The beginning, the ending, and all of that wonderful, painful, confusing stuff in between.

“What’ll happen to you?” asked Byleth.

Sothis stared at her looking for the first time like she had heard something new, something unexpected. “You’re worried about me?”

“You’ve been with me so long, I—” Byleth couldn’t remember a time before Sothis.

Sothis smiled, not a wicked one, but a nice one. Her teeth seemed a little less point too, which helped, “Do you really not want me to leave you alone?”

“No,” whispered Byleth honestly.

“Very well, I shall leave a little bit of me behind with you before I go. No powers, no crest of flames, just a little voice to keep you company,” promised Sothis pleasantly.

“And the rest of you? Where will you go, what will you do?”

Sothis laughed, a joyous child like laugh that filled the darkness up to the brim with it’s sound, “Oh child, I’m a goddess, I don’t answer to you.”

Sothis was floating so they were eye level. She leaned in and kissed Byleth gently on the forehead and the real world came back into view.

***

Sothis moved Byleth’s body with the indifference of a progenitor god that had come to loathe her creations. The goddess had been forced to wield her own spine as a weapon too many times to count. She had been woken up after death, which had a different god in charge of it, and forced to live over and over by a child that could not let go of her.

Sothis had no memory of Seiros, but she could access the version of herself that did. The motherly version that looked older, that version that Seiros so desperately loved. Sothis told Seiros she was sorry she didn’t teach her better. She had taught this daughter about love. She had taught her about life. She apparently needed to teach her about death and how it was supposed to be a permanent thing. She proceeded to do just that with the help of some weird kids her skin prison had befriended.

***

There was a lot of drinking that evening, and ill advised sexual encounters. Noteworthy moments included Hubert, who after six years of sobriety had absolutely zero tolerance, and Hilda drunkenly declaring that they were going to go, quote, “Make monsters.” They were thankfully intercepted by Marianne who knew both would regret that choice if they were sober, and instead the three of them snuggled with tiny baby pegasi all night. Hubert would later admit that he was afraid that Hilda would break all his bones, and probably his heart, if not for Marianne’s blessed intervention. Unfortunately for him, the phase ‘making monsters’ was permanently scared into everyone’s brains as innuendo for sex with Hubert. 

Emperor Edelgard broke out her violin and ushered in some raucous waltzing. Ferdinand put everyone to shame with his dancing and kept complaining he should have been in the White Heron Cup not Dorothea, who despite her injuries was still well enough to sing accompaniment to the music. Petra was mortified when Brutus decided to hump Claude’s wyvern but enjoyed talking with the prince about, well, just about everything that came up in their long conversation.

Not everyone was celebrating though. Linhardt quietly crawled into bed next to Caspar and didn’t sleep at all because he needed to be awake to make sure if anything bad happened he’d be alert and ready to heal his very injured best friend and partner. Sylvain collected up his son and prepared to journey home to tell his wife about what he’d done. He wasn’t sure his marriage to Ingrid would survive this, but he was going to fight to make it work. Mercedes had gone back to the safe thicket to find that Annette had left without a trace. Byleth, blue haired and crestless, took some time on her own to cry about Dimitri and Dedue, and how much she had loved them both through time. They were brave, they were good, and they were dead, permanently. It hurt fiercely, but a tiny familiar voice encouraged her to let out all her tears.

***

As for Sothis, she was so done with Fodlan and the late 1100’s. She was going to start by taking a nice long nap, and when she woke up, maybe then she’d decide it was time to end this world. Maybe not. She wasn’t sure, she’d sleep on it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Byleth and Sothis s-support unlocked?
> 
> Also, every time I see a lovely fan drawing of young Edelgard and Dimitri playing with a nice caption about how things could have been different if they just got to grow up together, I feel there should be an obligatory insert of "meanwhile in Enbarr" picturing poor little Hubert, alone and crying his eyes out while Slithers kill off the imperial family directly beneath his bedroom.


	13. von Vestra's War (epilogue)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One war has finished, another begins.

The end of the war was followed by a seemingly endless parade of engagements and weddings, both public and private. Ferdinand and Bernadetta only let their rushed engagement last as long as it took for all their closest friends to recover from the final battle and to clean up enough of Garreg Mach to get the ballroom presentable. It was a modest affair but Ferdinand and Bernadetta had combined their respective talents to make the most wondrous decorations from very little. 

Bernadetta’s bouquet had been a potted assortment of carnivorous plants from the greenhouse that was definitely not thrown towards any eager guests, and instead of corsages, all the groomsmen had embroidered flowers. The ceremony and following reception were timed to concur with afternoon tea, although Ferdinand had made sure there was coffee for Hubert. Instead of a big cake there was a plentiful assortment of small ones, with tea sandwiches, and small snacks instead of a typical wedding feast. However, it was getting quite late and the sun would soon set. Hubert sat looking at his note cards as he prepared to fumble through his best man speech. He doubted anyone had high expectations and Caspar had repeatedly asked Ferdinand if he was sure he wanted Hubert speaking, and literally not anyone else. 

Nervously, Hubert tapped his spoon against his coffee mug as he stood to signal that he was going to get this speech over with. “Um, when Ferdinand insisted that I do this, I was both surprised and suspicious. Surprised that we had become such good friends after such a rocky start and suspicious that this was his latest attempt to let me make an ass of myself in front of a crowd.” Hubert paused to let people snicker. “I’m not good at compliments, or congratulations. However, I am quite good at lecturing people,” Hubert paused again to allow the collective groan to subside. 

“Alright Ferdinand, you’re first since you demanded that I do this,” warned Hubert as he looked at Ferdinand sitting next to where he was standing. “You are the most noble noble I know, which I have often used as an insult rather than a complement. You have never been afraid to let anyone, even your Emperor, know when they are making what you believe to be a mistake, which is something we share. You manage to be ever so slightly more positive than me in communicating such sentiments, but I have come to see this as a common ground we share.” He shuffled his cards, “I know you will bring this sunny energy to your marriage, which is good because Bernadetta, like her plants, needs sun, so please make sure she leaves her room from time to time.” 

Bernadetta balked at his words and Hubert smiled despite himself trying to be serious, “Ah Bernadetta I have not forgotten about your lecture. You are an impossibly creative lady, in your hobbies and on the battlefield. You are very good at recognizing when a solution will not work or is unfair, like when I attempted to cease laughing or smiling in your presence since my face used to make you faint.” Hubert stopped so that the laughter could die down. “You always come up with quite crafty alternatives,” Hubert pulled on his embroidered corsage, “I believe that Fodlan is already a brighter place thanks to your union. So Ferdinand and Bernadetta, please keep combining your powers to identify problems and creatively fix them. May these skills serve you in your lives with each other, and your lives helping to run this fledgling Republic of Fodlan.” 

Hubert bowed to the polite clapping following his sorry excuse for a speech. He really wasn’t one for public speaking and he far preferred not to have that much attention on himself. However it was good he had been seen, at least this one last time. Almost no one here tonight knew, but this was also a sort of farewell for Hubert.

Emperor Edelgard and Hubert had already said their peace to each other in private, and she gave him a nod as he started to do his rounds. She was sitting beside the professor; Byleth had quietly presented Edelgard the ring Jeralt had once given her mother. The professor gave him a long, sad, knowing look and then a weak wave goodbye. 

Dorothea was dancing with some handsome artist that had been tagging along behind the army documenting the war. Hubert cut in just long enough to dance with her like he wished he could have at the Garreg Mach ball they’d skipped so many years ago. He pulled her close just long enough to whisper, “See you on the other side,” into her ear and kissed her on the cheek. 

“Where are you going?” she teased tipsily. 

“Just for some air,” lied Hubert as he ushered her back to her chosen partner for the evening. 

Petra was teaching Claude some Brigid dance that he was mimicking quite well. She was laughing, and Hubert felt a little foolish about the engagement ring currently in his pocket as he watched them. Hubert sighed and gave her a quick half smile as he wondered if he’d ever see her again. At least his last memory of her would be her looking happy, not crying over something terrible he’d said. 

Lysithea and Felix had quietly exchanged vows in the Sealed Forest, with just a handful of witnesses. They weren’t dancing tonight, just enjoying each other’s presence. Hubert stopped by their table and took Lysithea’s hand to give it a gentle squeeze, “If you don’t hear from me within six months, assume the worst.” 

“We always assume the worst about you,” said Felix with a smirk as he gave Hubert a nod. 

“Good luck,” said Lysithea as Hubert released her hand, “Don’t hesitate to call on us for back up.” 

“When the time comes, you’ll be first to know,” promised Hubert before moving on. 

Caspar was sitting with Fleche and Hubert grabbed them both and did his best attempt at a Bergliez hug. He made sure not to squeeze too hard because Caspar was still pretty sore. He passed by Linhardt and decided not to wake him. Then Hubert left the hall, and left the Black Eagles for good. 

What he was taking with him was long since packed. He shed his formal attire and changed into his traveling clothes. They were basic and unassuming, and selected to blend into the darkness. He checked the ring again and hoped it was alright. He’d been a little rushed in getting it, and had to rely on the Dark Merchant to come through with whatever suitable thing he could scare up. The end result had been a white gold ring set with a small, single black pearl. Hubert felt it suited its intended recipient. 

Hubert felt sheepish walking to the goddess tower. He didn’t much care for superstition but if they were going to do this anywhere, it might as well be here. 

“Lord Vestra,” sighed the person meeting him there.

“Ms. von Martritz,” said Lord Vestra as they lingered at the entrance. The tower was in as bad of shape as ever, but no one else was here to interrupt or overhear. 

“Of all the places to start this journey,” said Mercedes as she looked at the ruin. 

“I figured we could use all the blessings we can get,” said Lord Vestra as he leaned against the outer wall. He got out the ring, “You know you can still back out.” 

“So can you,” she challenged. They stared at each other for a few beats and knew that neither of them was capable from walking away from this next war. 

Lord Vestra nodded as he slid the ring onto her finger, “Mercedes von Martritz, I vow to protect you to the best of my abilities in the place we are about to go.” 

Mercedes spared a small smile at his selection, and then pulled out the plain band she’d brought for him, “Hubert von Vestra, I promise to stay by your side until this is done and we have our revenge.” 

They didn’t kiss. This was a fake marriage that just needed to look real enough to fool the Agarthans. It was the only way they could ensure they’d be allowed to stay together when they descended into Shambhala. The plan was to get there, work their way into the Slithers hierarchy, find out all they could to solve the two crest problem plaguing Lysithea and Edelgard, and then send the place to hell. 

Mercie and Hubert took a deep breath and then walked forward into the fading light with a single lantern shared in their hands. They dared not look back, and focused only on the long road ahead of them. They were cutting the path into the darkness, so that they could clear the way for the others to follow towards a world that would hopefully be a little brighter when they were done. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay thanks for reading! The comments and kudos were very appreciated if not a little addicting. 
> 
> Because exam proctoring is dull and hands free work, I kind of already wrote out most of a bitter, soft ending for the series. So if you're in school and your instructor is quietly chuckling to themselves while you suffer though a final exam, they might be writing long weird fan fiction to entertain themselves.


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